No Time to Die [2021)

Benito Que, Donald C. Wiley, Vladimir Pasechnik, Robert Schwartz, Set Van Nguyen, Vladimir Korshunov, and Ian Langford. Not to mention Air Sibir 1812 (shot down by Ukrainian SAM). Five microbiologists aboard. Israeli microbiologists? En route to Novosibirsk. Also not to mention Swissair crash on approach to Zurich. Died: head of hematology Ichilov Hospital (Israel). Died: directors of Tel Aviv Public Health Department and Hebrew University of Medicine. 33 passengers. 24 died. All Israelis aboard died. Possible names (pseudonyms?): Avishai Berkman, Amiram Eldor, and Yaacov Matzner.

https://www.fromthewilderness.net/free/ww3/02_14_02_microbio.html

Masaji Kitano.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Masaji_Kitano

Doctors of death.

Listen to the master, Dr. Steve Pieczenik, M.D., Ph.D., speak about this.

https://stevepieczenik.com/2021/08/09/opus-8821-doctors-of-death/

Yoshio Shinozuka.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yoshio_Shinozuka

Yasuji Kaneko.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yasuji_Kaneko

War criminals.

Ichirō Hatoyama (Japanese PM 1954-1956).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ichir%C5%8D_Hatoyama

Nobusuke Kishi (Japanese PM 1957-1960).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nobusuke_Kishi

Hayato Ikeda (Japanese PM 1960-1964).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hayato_Ikeda

Three Japanese Prime Ministers.

Not indicted.

Please explain Trump’s position on the COVID vaccines.

General Otozō Yamada.

Sentenced to 25 years in a labor camp by the Soviets.

Served only seven years before being repatriated to Japan.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Otoz%C5%8D_Yamada

General Shunji Sato (a physician).

Sentenced to 20 years in prison.

Served only seven years before being repatriated to Japan.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shunji_Sato

Bacteria mass production.

Under “epidemic prevention” and “water purification” euphemisms:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epidemic_Prevention_and_Water_Purification_Department

Rami Malek character Lucifer (Lyutsifer).

Peter Daszak working for CIA?

Anthony Fauci covering for CIA?

Fauci covering for U.S. military?

Sticky situation.

Are the statements of Dr. Jon McGreevey (Ryan Dark White) legitimate?

I believe Lin Wood has thoroughly discredited himself by now with his incessant attacks on (particulary) General Michael Flynn.

But could Lin Wood’s whistleblower by bona fide?

He’s running for U.S. Senate in Maryland.

And then you have Ron Watkins (CodeMonkeyZ) running for U.S. House of Representatives in Arizona.

Might as well throw in Bobby Piton running for U.S. Senate in Illinois.

Per McGreevey:

he claims that COVID is a defensive bioweapon “designed to protect the United States” and also (most notably) that he himself designed it. According to McGreevey, it is called GenAegis (Genetic Shield). McGreevey elaborates on it a bit here…”a weapon designed to seek out certain DNA, programmable […] they can make endless variants”.

Sound familiar?

https://web.archive.org/web/20210725044535/https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1418973700108476420.html

McGreevey’s assertion is that Obama and Biden gave this bioweapon to China (who then converted it to an offensive bioweapon?).

It was (according to him) developed at Fort Detrick (Maryland).

How does this comport with USMC Major Joseph Murphy’s recent whistleblowing to Project Veritas?

Murphy claims that COVID was a vaccine FOR bats (which was to be administered in an aerosolized version by spraying it into caves in China), but that it leaked out of the Wuhan lab before it was finished.

Murphy’s main contention is that DARPA refused the project, but NIAID (which Fauci runs) then subsequently accepted the project.

The project was proposed to DARPA by the EcoHealth Alliance (run by Peter Daszak).

JAG_Docs_pt1_Og_WATERMARK_OVER_Redacted 2

This evidence was discovered by Murphy in his capacity at DARPA.

The evidence is now ostensibly being held by the Marine Corps Intelligence Activity (MCIA) at Quantico.

Note that NCIS is also HQ at Quantico.

And of course there is FBI there as well.

[not to mention United States Army Criminal Investigation Command (USACID) and U.S. Air Force Office of Special Investigations (AFOSI or OSI)]

But let’s back up to NCIS for a moment.

Why does Ron DeSantis (Navy JAG) seem so much more wise than Donald Trump on the COVID vaccines in these last couple of months?

DeSantis has not gone full-retard like the man who should win the Nobel Peace Prize (Dr. Robert Malone), but DeSantis also hasn’t shot his mouth off like the buffoon Trump.

What happened to Trump?

Great President.

And then he broadcasts to the world that he got the Pfizer vaccine (while encouraging people to take these shots)?

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/donald-trump-i-got-the-pfizer-125703879.html

And he casually drops his booster status after a crowd in Dallas gathered to hear him speak had just sung the Christian hymn “How Great Thou Art”? [sounds like Hochul’s church vaccine speech]

https://www.yahoo.com/entertainment/trump-played-conspiracy-theory-hits-024518810.html

And then Trump lies (?) to Candace Owens about people taking the vaccines not dying?

https://www.axios.com/trump-candace-owens-dying-vaccine-covid-92fd3eb3-f5ec-4167-8649-113903119de1.html

And finally, Trump makes what appears to be a pointed reference to DeSantis in which Trump insinuates that DeSantis is “gutless” for not revealing his booster status?

https://www.thedailybeast.com/trump-roasts-gutless-desantis-for-keeping-his-booster-status-a-secret

Just what the hell has been going on with Donald Trump?!?

These outbursts have caused me to lose all faith in him.

I would take DeSantis (or Ron Paul, or Tucker Carlson, or Candace Owens, or Robert Malone, or RFK Jr. or almost anyone) over Trump at this point.

Trump has backed off the vaccine-pushing.

But I have to say: that is not good enough.

The man need only visit two websites to understand the danger of these vaccines:

the criminally-parsed version

https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/vaccines/safety/adverse-events.html

-and-

the actual version

https://openvaers.com/covid-data/mortality

These figures (11,879 and 23,149 [respectively]) should be increased by a factor of 10 to account for the historical underreporting to the passive-surveillance (voluntary) VAERS system [HHS] of serious adverse events such as Kawasaki disease (i.e. 118,790 deaths or 231,490 deaths).

https://www.bmj.com/rapid-response/2011/11/02/underreporting-vaccine-adverse-events

And in case anyone wants to play the “correlation does not necessarily equal causation” card, consider this:

https://openvaers.com/covid-data

As for their efficacy…

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-covid-deaths-2021-vaccines-b1963790.html

And of course there is this gem about ethno-specific bioweapons:

https://www.wired.com/1998/11/israels-ethnic-weapon/

Are you starting to understand why China and Silicon Valley want your DNA?

This is a new kind of war where certain people will be purposefully made susceptible and others purposefully made nonsusceptible to bioweapons released on a massive scale.

Not to mention that the vaccines are debilitating the U.S. military (while SecDef Austin [a General] and CJCS Milley stand around with their dicks in their hands).

That’s treason!

They should have known.

And if they didn’t know, they’re still responsible.

The buck stops with them.

https://vimeo.com/533241402

Why the insane push for all of humanity to receive vaccines that are neither safe, nor effective?

And why is Trump’s “solidarity” with the Canadian truckers (Freedom Convoy) so at odds with his months of moronic statements regarding the vaccines?

Does he not realize that these people are rising up PRIMARILY BECAUSE OF THE VACCINES HE BROUGHT INTO THE WORLD?!?

Don’t forget that Trump’s Operation Warp Speed (of which he is evidently so proud [see Candace Owens article above]) ALSO PAID FOR THE AstraZenca VACCINE (WHICH IS NOT EVEN AVAILABLE AT ALL IN THE USA)!!!

[not to mention three others we funded that are also not available at all in the USA: Novavax, Sanofi, and GlaxoSmithKline]

https://web.archive.org/web/20201219231756/https://www.hhs.gov/coronavirus/explaining-operation-warp-speed/index.html

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oxford%E2%80%93AstraZeneca_COVID-19_vaccine

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Novavax_COVID-19_vaccine

It should be noted that there is not a Sanofi or GSK COVID vaccine approved anywhere in the world.

Where did those $2 billion dollars we gave them go?

While Sanofi and GSK took HHS (U.S. taxpayer) money and ran (producing nothing?), here are the other countries which have developed their own COVID vaccines:

–China (8 different vaccines [Sinopharm BIBP, CoronaVac, Convidecia, Sinopharm WIBP, Zifivax, Minhai, Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences, and Sinopharm CNBG])

–Russia (4 different vaccines [Sputnik V, Sputnik Light, EpiVacCorona, and CoviVac])

–Iran (4 different vaccines [COVIran Barekat, FAKHRAVAC, COVAX-19 {in conjunction with Australian company CinnaGen}, and Razi Cov Pars])

–India (3 different vaccines [Covaxin, ZyCoV-D, and Corbevax {developed by Texas Children’s Hospital < ! > and Baylor College of Medicine <Houston>}])

–Cuba (3 different vaccines [Abdala, Soberana 02, Soberana Plus])

–Turkey (Turkovac)

–Kazakhstan (QazCovid-in)

–Taiwan (Medigen)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_COVID-19_vaccine_authorizations

Why was a children’s hospital and medical school in Texas developing a COVID vaccine that is only available in India (licensed to Biological E. Limited [BioE])?

Who paid for it?

Where’s Rand Paul?

This is a huge waste of money.

The three vaccines we got (Pfizer, Moderna, and Johnson & Johnson [which were totally unnecessary to rush {considering the low mortality rate of COVID-19 <relative to ebola or smallpox, for instance>}]) are neither safe, nor effective.

If Trump knows the available vaccines in the USA aren’t safe (how could he not know?), then he is liable for the death and injury caused by his encouragement for people to take the vaccines.

State Department character based on Ash Carter?

State Department infiltrated by Rami Malek.

CIA is trusting a foreign agent.

Death of Felix Leiter.

Death of James Bond.

Is 007 now a black lesbian like mayor Lightfoot of Chicago and disgraced BLM cofounder Patrice Cullors?

Q is gay.

Houston recently had a white lesbian mayor [Annise Parker].

And what about black lesbian Karine Jean-Pierre (KJP [Psaki’s backup])?

Is this some kind of cult?

That’s a lot of black lesbians.

And one white lesbian.

Muriel Bowser (D.C. mayor)?

Donna Brazile?

Lashana Lynch is aptly named after androgynous Klaus Nomi.

Is 007 now a black transexual?

Spoiler alert: James Bond dies.

Is this the end of the series?

And the Bond franchise has to keep the diversity in high gear.

Who cast this movie: Richard Torres-Estrada?

Bishop Garrison?

Lloyd Austin?

Mark Milley?

Michael Gilday?

At least Ana de Armas is charming.

I can’t say the same about Lashana Lynch.

What the fuck is this woke shit?!?

Ian Fleming would be puking his guts out.

Assange in Belmarsh.

But let’s make sure we have the score here.

The one representative of the CIA (Felix Leiter): black male.

Miss Moneypenny: black female.

The new 007: black female.

What percentage of the U.K. is black?

3.3%.

Three percent.

https://www.ethnicity-facts-figures.service.gov.uk/uk-population-by-ethnicity/national-and-regional-populations/population-of-england-and-wales/latest

This is a British film.

Eon Productions Ltd.

Piccadilly (London).

Pinewood Studios.

But the film was also produced by MGM.

Beverly Hills.

Ok.

What percentage of the USA is black?

14.2%.

https://www.pewresearch.org/social-trends/fact-sheet/facts-about-the-us-black-population/

Ok.

So let’s look at the main characters.

Daniel Craig: British white male.

Léa Seydoux: French white female.

Rami Malek: Egyptian-American [African-American] male.

Lashana Lynch: British black female.

Ben Whishaw: British white male.

Naomie Harris: British black female.

Jeffrey Wright: African-American [black] male.

Christoph Waltz: Austrian-German white male.

Ralph Fiennes: British white male.

Billy Magnussen: American white male.

Ana De Armas: Cuban-Spanish female.

David Dencik: Danish-Swedish white male.

Rory Kinnear: British white male.

Dali Benssalah: French-Algerian male.

14 characters.

It’s nominally a British movie (although co-produced by American company MGM).

What percentage of the main cast is British?

6/14 (43%).

Less than half of the main cast is British.

What percentage of the main cast is American?

3/14 (21%).

That means 36% of the main cast is neither British, nor American.

Why?

Maybe the story called for it.

The evil guys have to be exotic.

Rami Malek (Egyptian heritage) and Christoph Waltz (Germanic).

Dencik (the biological weapons guy) is a Scandinavian playing a Russian.

Also a baddie.

What percentage of the main cast is white?

8/14 (57%).

The good guy (James Bond) is white.

But two of the three villains are also white.

The third main villain is of Egyptian descent.

What percentage of the main cast is male?

10/14 (71%).

It is an action movie.

Who goes to war?

Men?

Are women drafted into most militaries in the world?

Do they participate in combat roles?

How often?

What percentage of the main cast is white male?

7/14 (50%).

Let’s be honest.

The James Bond franchise cucked out to the looters and arsonists of BLM.

Eon and MGM kneeled in fealty to woke Hollywood.

Continuing.

What percentage of the main cast is black?

3/14 (21%).

This is the important number.

Britain is 3.3% black.

So blacks are WAY overrepresented in what is a British franchise.

But even if we figure in the American coproducer MGM, blacks are still overrepresented.

America is 14.2% black.

So blacks are even overrepresented here by 50% in relation to the American production company.

But here’s the other important part.

Of the top seven characters (as they are listed in the Wikipedia entry for this film [presumably based on screentime]), three are black.

3/7 (43% of the “stars” or leading roles in this film are played black people).

Compare that to the 3.3% British black population.

Or the 14.2% American black population.

This is an absurdly-high overrepresentation of black people!

For what?

Are 43% of box office returns in the USA because of black viewers?

I highly fucking doubt it.

And do the 3.3% of Britain who are black make up 43% of the viewership (i.e. revenue) there?

There is strictly no chance.

So this movie is a woke joke.

A woke disaster.

In terms of casting.

The worst is Lashana Lynch.

Not talented. Not charming. Completely ill-cast.

Jeffrey Wright is mediocre.

Nothing special.

The best is Naomie Harris.

SHE should have been the black, female 007 (if they were going to go that route).

For fucksake…she was a field agent in Skyfall.

Why the fuck did she get relegated to becoming M’s secretary?

She’s charming.

She’s capable.

Neither of which (in the acting sense) can be said about Lashana Lynch.

Lynch is most similar to Gloria Hendry in Live and Let Die.

At least Hendry was attractive.

Sexy.

And funny.

Or we could compare Lynch to another androgynous abomination: Trina Parks (Thumper) in Diamonds Are Forever.

Nothing like a flat-as-a-board, muscular black woman to get the heterosexual male fired up.

This is, again (after all), an action movie.

Who is the target audience?

Does the LGBTQ community really get into James Bond?

I don’t fucking think so.

At least Trump is right about this: “Everything woke turns to shit.”

There are disaster movies.

And then there are movies that are disasters.

This is the latter.

What a fucking woke piece of shit.

And who was responsible for this artistic abomination?

Bay Area failed-snowboarder, Japanese-American Cary Joji Fukunaga.

This dude was totally unqualified to shoot a Bond film.

And it shows.

What a fucking ripoff.

Don’t waste your money on this piece-of-shit film.

Danny Boyle (both excellent Trainspotting films) should have directed this movie.

It appears that Fukunaga not only killed James Bond, but killed the James Bond franchise as well.

Great job, fucktard!

Fuck you, you piece-of-shit, no-talent director.

-PD

Stieg Larssons Millennium: Del 1 [2010)

You thought we were done.

You’ve wasted so much ammunition.

Having fun yet?

Electoral College meeting date.

December 14.

Sandy Hook.

Harriet Vanger disappearance.

September 22.

Stieg Larsson’s death.

November 9.

Election day.

November 3.

Larsson dies before any of his novels are published?

Dies before the fantastic success of both the novels and subsequent films.

Heart attack at age 50 “after climbing the stairs at work”.

His grandfather had also died of a heart attack at age 50?

He was a smoker, they say.

Like Lisbeth Salander.

Click to access v19i3a01p.pdf

Search CIA heart attack gun.

Get this.

The Soviets developed first (ostensibly).

Just like MKUltra.

Not brainwashing, but “deprogramming” those POWs brainwashed during the Korean war.

Ostensibly.

And the Nazis were just “researching” when they conducted human experiments on Jews and other prisoners, right?

https://sofrep.com/news/watch-former-cia-employees-discuss-heart-attack-gun/

Per Oscarsson dies in house fire after appearing in the final Millennium Trilogy film.

December 31.

Wennerström.

Corrupt billionaire of fiction.

Stig Wennerström.

Actual Swedish Air Force colonel convicted of spying on behalf of the Soviets.

He was suspected by SÄPO (the Swedish equivalent of the FBI) of working for the Nazis as early as 1943.

From working with the Nazis (national socialism), he dovetailed into working for the Soviets (socialism/communism).

OPUS 240 Fascism comes from the Left!

Wennerström could have been executed by firing squad for treason because, after all, there was a war on (the Cold War).

War on Terrorism.

Was the end declared?

Instead, he was given a life sentence (which was later commuted to 20 years).

In 1972.

Think hippies.

What country do Bernie Sanders, AOC, et al. most want to copy?

Replicate their “democratic-socialist” utopia?

Sweden.

And I get it.

It is an alluring trick.

Sweden is a beautiful country.

The land is beautiful.

The women (with cans of General Snus in the back pockets of their tight bluejeans) are beautiful.

Even rednecks like me could be fooled.

Briefly.

By the façade.

The “Nordic model” countries (with their literal female models in tow).

Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway, and (chiefly powering the Left’s zeitgeist) Sweden.

But Norway has a shit-ton of oil.

Oops.

But I see it.

Walk down the cobbled streets of a small Danish town and you too may be swayed by the seeming utopia.

America is not a Nordic country.

And as Nordic countries (particularly Sweden) attempt to mimic AMERICAN leftist policies (think immigration), they see their homogenous utopias ripped apart.

There are reasons certain forms of government work IN CERTAIN PLACES.

There are factors.

Variables.

America, at this point in its history, cannot whole-cloth adopt the Swedish system.

And any leftist with a brain knows this.

But it doesn’t prevent American leftists from dangling the Swedish carrot (fish?) in front of the noses of their moronic acolytes.

And, as alluded to earlier, it is meant to draw the weak-minded “across the aisle”.

“Come on over. Everything will be just like Sweden. Not the current Sweden, of course, but…you know: the old Sweden.”

Two years after Wennerström’s life sentence was commuted to 20 years, he was paroled.

He had only been in custody for 10 years.

10 years for sharing 20,000 secret documents with the Soviets concerning Swedish air defenses, clandestine Swedish bases, etc.

This was the Swedish custom.

Serve half your sentence and get paroled.

Initial sentence could have been death [treason] (Cold War).

Actual sentence was life.

Sentence commuted to 20 years.

Cut in half (10 years) by parole.

That’s Sweden (in the early ’70s) and, perhaps, quintessential Swedish policy.

The “Nordic model”.

Lovely.

No justice, really.

No defense, really.

No state secrets, really.

No sovereignty, in actuality.

Bad trajectory.

About as robust a defense apparatus as an IKEA bed.

Which is to say.

Cheap.

Disposable.

Nice-looking.

Interesting that Sweden is not a part of NATO.

What if the big, bad Russians (who have 20,000 secret documents pertaining to radar, strategy, mobilization plans…) actually were to invade Sweden?

Those are old documents by now, of course.

But the Russians have a very easy sell to potential Swedish spies.

“Don’t worry. There’s no declared war. This isn’t the Cold War. No treason. No firing squad. If you get life in prison, it will probably be commuted to a paltry 20 years. And you’ll be paroled after 10. If you even get caught.”

Great deterrence, Sweden!

Back to the “Nordic model”…

Guess who ARE members of NATO?

Denmark, Iceland, and Norway.

Finland, right on Russia’s doorstep, are (like the Swedes) not members of NATO.

For more examples of Sweden’s liberal (lax) justice/prison apparatus, see the case of spy Stig Bergling.

Sentenced to life (like Wennerström).

Fled to Moscow during a conjugal visit (you can’t make this shit up!).

Voluntarily returned to Sweden seven years after his escape.

And was PAROLED three years later.

Again, this was DURING the Cold War.

Bergling’s arrest was a full 15 YEARS after Wennerström’s.

In other words, this was the next generation (same shitty policies) of spies being slapped on the wrist.

Bergling was parolled in 1997.

Ahh, that liberal paradise…Sweden.

Unlike Switzerland, it has no natural defenses (mountains) to guarantee its continued paradisal existence.

Need more?

Bertil Ströberg.

Swedish Air Force.

Convicted of spying for Poland [Soviet bloc] during the Cold War.

Sentenced to a mere six years in prison.

Paroled after three years.

Which brings us back to the brilliant (I mean it!) Swedish storyteller Stieg Larsson…himself a committed leftist (going so far as to train guerrillas in Eritrea in the firing or mortars).

What of Vanger?

VOLVO?

Volvokoncernen.

ASEA (the now-defunct General Swedish Electrical Company Limited) removed the swastika from their logo in 1933.

The company’s swastika logo had been used since the late-19th century.

Etymology

What if it’s a similar sound?

Fanger

In Swedish, “catches”.

Like in a cage?

Fanger.

In closely-related Danish, “prisoners”.

Like in cages?

What if a letter is missing?

Svanger.

In Swedish, “pregnant”.

Like, pregnant with meaning?

[svan, btw, means “swan” in Swedish]

Pregnant swan?

Like Leda of Greek mythology?

Zeus, in the form of a swan, raped Leda (a woman) who became pregnant and gave birth to “the most beautiful woman in the world”: Helen of Troy.

And around whom does this mystery revolve?

The hauntingly-beautiful Henrietta (Helen?) Vanger.

Who had been been repeatedly raped by her father and brother.

[it is true that the Swedish equivalent of Helen would be Helena or Elin, but the initials match]

How did Larsson come to settle on this name Vanger?

Some have suggested Wagner.

Perhaps even Wegner.

Wenger?

Wolf, in Swedish, is “varg”.

Varger?

Vargar, in Swedish, is “wolves”.

Now we are getting somewhere.

But we must flesh out the story.

We are looking for three Swedish Nazi brothers.

I believe the fourth (the good guy) was invented by Larsson.

Three Swedish Nazis?

How about Birger, Gunnar, and Sigurd Furugård?

They founded the Swedish National Socialist Farmers’ and Workers’ Party in 1924.

It’s a good fit.

The good guy might just be IKEA founder Ingvar Kamprad.

By “good”, I mean that he was a member of the Swedish SSS (Svensk Socialistisk Samling [National Socialist Workers’ Party…basically Swedish Nazis]) at age 17 and before that, at age 16, a member of the fascist New Swedish Movement WHO LATER DECLARED (in 1994) that his membership in the latter was the “greatest mistake” of his life. His association with the SSS wasn’t publicly revealed until 2011 (at which time he made no further comment on having been a part of these types of groups).

So maybe Ingvar Kamprad wasn’t the good guy after all?

Did Larsson meld the Furugårds (Nazis) and Kamprad (a successful business man…and Nazi) into the amalgamation we know as the Vanger family?

https://web.archive.org/web/20120420065622/https://www.telegraph.co.uk/history/world-war-two/8720214/IKEA-founder-was-Nazi-recruiter.html

Kamprad, incidentally, is a variant of “comrade”.

Again, National SOCIALIST German Workers’ Party.

NAZIs.

So “far right” (says Wikipedia) that they were fucking socialists!?!

NAtionalsoZIalistische.

Socialist.

IKEA.

Sweden.

This is exactly what Pieczenik is talking about in the above video.

Fascism coming from the Left.

Kamprad started off with fascism (New Swedish Movement) and a year later went full-Nazi (National Socialist Workers’ Party).

Again, socialist.

You can’t take that word out of there.

And Antifa started as “anti-fascist” [against the Nazis, but FOR communism].

And they remain communist (leftist) and have devolved, ironically, into a fascist organization themselves (at least in America…where their tactics are indistinguishable from those of Hitler and Mussolini’s respective gangs [Sturmabteilung/SA/Braunhemden/Brownshirts & MVSM/Blackshirts/squadristi]).

BTW…IKEA was founded by a 17-year-old Ingvar Kamprad.

Yes, that’s right: he is confirmed in the above link to have been a member of the SSS [essentially the Swedish Nazi party] that very same year.

1943.

As for Lisbeth, look no further than the alleged Norwegian witch Lisbeth Nypan.

Salander.

Salamander.

Fire.

“blotches on its back”.

From mythology to the real life fire salamander (Salamandra salamandra).

Poisonous.

Europe.

Frigidity (able to extinguish fire).

But also “a product of fire”.

Newts.

Witchcraft.

Wizards and warlocks.

1966.

Disappearance of the Beaumont children (on Australia Day).

Church of Satan formed by Anton LaVey.

Moors murder trial.

Five children (between the ages of 10 and 17) murdered in and around Manchester between 1963 and 1965. At least four were sexually assaulted.

Killer (Ian Brady) read Mein Kampf and books on Nazi atrocities.

Gertrude Baniszewski found guilty of murdering and torturing Sylvia Likens in Indianapolis. Paroled in 1985 [American justice failure].

Charles Whitman kills 14 people with a sniper rifle from above the UT-Austin Tower (after killing his wife and mother).

September 22.

Lindwal railway incident.

Anna Karina born.

Nick Cave born.

Magda 30112.

Sara 32016.

BJ 32027.

LI 31208.

Mari 32018.

-PD

Romancing the Stone [1984)

This movie was very dear to me as a kid.

It’s one of those which came on TV all the time.

And it always pulled me in.

For me, nothing in this film beats the scene in which Kathleen Turner and Michael Douglas huddle ’round a marijuana campfire in the fuselage of a crashed plane.

Taking strong belts of Jose Cuervo tequila.

Basically sitting in a giant bong 🙂

But the best part–the cutest part…is KT eating olives.

An old jar. To be sure.

But they last awhile.

And liquor kills all germs, right?

Who cares if the dead pilot took a few swigs long ago 🙂

It’s such a cozy scene.

Perhaps it’s what the Danish mean by hygge.

And it’s an ambiance I’ve only seen approached in Vertigo (Kim Novak and Jimmy Stewart by the fireplace in his apartment…after he rescues her from the waters of San Francisco Bay) and, surprisingly, The Pink Panther (David Niven and Claudia Cardinale by the fireplace…Claudia on the tiger-skin rug).

But Romancing the Stone, unlike those two films, is a full-on romcom.

Sure, there’s action…to entice the leery men 🙂

But there’s no denying that this is a romantic comedy.

And so I’m glad to join the ranks of romcom lovers.

Glad to christen a new category on my site with this fine film.

Some of it hasn’t aged so well (like Alan Silvestri’s sequenced electro-samba soundtrack), but most of it has…so kudos to director Robert Zemeckis.

Zach Norman plays a gay villain in such a way that one cannot help thinking of John Podesta.

Danny DeVito, who plays Norman’s cousin, is definitely the funniest thing in this film.

Neither Turner nor Douglas are particularly funny, but they are graceful and charming (respectively).

I would even add that Michael Douglas encapsulates a sort of masculinity which has been on the wane since the 1980s in America…UNTIL DONALD TRUMP WON THE FUCKING PRESIDENCY!

Yeah 🙂

It is trippy.

To watch this movie late at night.

To relive childhood memories.

And then to rouse oneself to one’s feet and think, “Is Donald Trump really the President? Is this not some kind of dream???” 🙂

I know for many it is a nightmare.

So I will just leave that train of thought there. For now.

Actually, there is a more serious villain in this film: Manuel Ojeda.

He is certainly a BAD HOMBRE 🙂

[sorry, can’t help it]

So yeah…

The bulk of the action takes place in Colombia.

It’s like William S. Burroughs, in search of yage, writing back to Allen Ginsberg.

Though the narrative becomes evermore-farfetched as it unfurls, it’s so much fun that we don’t much care 🙂

Buried treasure? Check.

Wrestling crocodiles? Check.

Mr. Dundee and The Goonies were from this same era 🙂

Alfonso Arau is here too…with his little “mule” 🙂

[I guess, on second thought, that is a drug-smuggling joke]

This was the performance which preceded Mr. Arau’s all-world turn as El Guapo in Three Amigos.

Yeah…the plot really gets ridiculous right after the waterfall 🙂

But this is a feel-good movie!

And we need this kind of stuff.

Sitting down to ENJOY a movie 🙂

What a concept!

-PD

6 Comments

Democrats [2014)

For so long I dreamed.

Of visiting Africa.

Merely in film.

To say that I was not narrow-minded.

And to honor the one friend I have ever known from that beautiful continent.

A native of Chad.

Tchad.

And a former resident of Côte d’Ivoire.

Because I love geography.

But, even more, I love people.

And I am pleased to report that this documentary, about ZIMBABWE, is a masterpiece.

Directed by a Dane (as in Denmark) by the name of Camilla Nielsson.

And currently available in the U.S. for streaming on Netflix.

It is a recursive process.

For so long I cried.

When I thought of slavery.

When I saw the beautiful face of a black man.

And the teeth with many gaps.

I now know.

I can say.

My dear friend.

You look like you may have come from Zimbabwe.

But recursion may become tiresome.

So we will plop with geography for a moment.

Sadly ignoring Chad and Ivory Coast for the time being, we must locate (firmly) Zimbabwe on a map.

Champagne Castle.

Remove your sanctions.

Remove your sunshades.

Looks like South Africa (south)…and Botswana (west)…additionally Mozambique (east)…and gets hairy from there.

But you needs must only remember that the two Zs flock together: Zimbabwe and Zambia.

And so to the north (by way of northwest [not possible]) is Zambia.

Lusaka.

And over Angola is Luanda.

Lusaka.

Luanda.

You are really getting the hang of this 🙂

Have you thought about working for the State Department?

Recursive.

Going back.

But wait…there’s less!

Just remember that Zimbabwe is southeast Afrique.

Not on the coast.

That’s -zambique.

But landlocked.

Have you ever heard the rot of colonialism?

No no.

Have you ever heard a landlocked brass band?

The pitiful, wailing clarinets…

Landlocked is potentially poverty.

At the mercy of your neighbors.

Over land. Over sea.

One. Two. If.

Recur thyself!

No…

We must say it: MUGABE!

A big, fucking rockstar of totalitarianism.

Nah…

Dictatorshit!

Yes. His dictator shit!

As when the Dalai Lama was a boy.

And they kept his turds.

Because he was some kind of golden child.

But President Mugabe (since 1980) will forever have the ignominy of that desafinado military band behind him.

Celebrations like dirges.

Gloriously out of tune!

Nothing slight about it!!

And every head bows…and every knee genuflects in fealty.

A spry 93 years old.

And President of Zimbabwe for a mere 37 years.

He ain’t a king.

And worse: he’s only 4th on the list of usurping motherfuckers!

You’d have to go to shitholes like Angola (ahh, Luanda…), Cameroon, and the kicker (!) Equatorial Guinea to find jerks who have managed to outlast the black Hitler.

But I like Mugabe.

[what?????????]

No, no…let me explain.

First: the guy does have a Hitler mustache. More or less.

But that’s not why I like him. I don’t dig Hitler.

Wait…do I like Mugabe?

Well, there’s a time and place for everything (and everyone).

As you watch Democrats (mercifully…for all involved…NOT about the U.S. Democratic Party), you might grow attached to the various fuckers involved.

Politicians.

Lawyers!

But Third World lawyers.

Some sad shit…

But most importantly: brave, noble human beings.

You wanna see a real revolution?

Watch this film.

You wanna see some real sacrifices for democracy?

Watch this film.

To be sure…democracy is ugly!

And we Americans are the best at it.

Anything goes!

Fight, fuck, kill…but more like lie, cheat, deceive…yeah.

Democracy brings out the worst in people.

But it arrives at the best result.

It’s a goddamned crucible.

Just to think…that the master copy of the Constitution of Zimbabwe (ostensibly the subject of this film) was on a fucking Dell laptop.

Dell.

Right up the road from me.

Round Rock.

In the Westerns…

Michael Dell’s Horatio Alger story…at UT-Austin.

Even closer to me.

And #vault7.

So that we know that every scintilla–every Oxford comma was hacked by the CIA and/or NSA and known throughout the Five Eyes…even before the leaked hard copy hit newsstands in Harare.

Ah!

Another capital…

Reçu.

I can never go back. Enough. TO give you a full telling.

I guess Paul Mangwana is still alive.

This.

The character that grows on you.

From chuckling social engineer.

To political operative shitting his pants.

How do you say “damage control” in Shona?

Exactly.

And Susan Rice is a bitch.

But that’s neither here nor there.

Because Democrats so precisely parallels the recent U.S. election.

The drama. Allegations.

The swaggering strongman.

Yeah…Juan Williams would ride to town on that correlation.

So is Trump Mugabe?

Fuck no.

Not yet.

And probably not ever.

But liberals will have a field day with this possibility.

Social justice warriors will mouth off like the surly reporter from South Africa.

What an asshole!

And so we sympathize with Mr. Mangwana.

What a precarious position he was put in!

To try and bring the illusion of constitutionality to the ZANU-PF party.

But wait a minute…wait a minute…you ain’t heard nothing yet!

Remember, remember…that a black leader can repress black people.

America thought it was fine and dandy…and candy-shop clean when it elected CIA agent Barack Obama.

That turned out to be a big mistake.

One doesn’t investigate one’s own employer pursuant to crimes against humanity (9/11) when such equates to biting the hand that feeds.

Obama lost control.

And tried to get a little African in his lame-duck months.

Oops.

Yes…only democracy in the Middle East? Israel? You’ve got to be joking.

And Zimbabweans were so hopeful after the Mwangana/Mwonzora conclave wrapped up its two-year-overlong constitutional convention.

Got a little #MAGA in you?

Check out how a constitution is crafted.

If wasn’t all ass-kissing in Philadelphia.

Some genuinely contentious points.

And the Obamacare “Repeal and Replace” that just narrowly failed.

Think that wasn’t stressful?

Freedom Caucus gonna be outta jobs.

Saving their butts.

Sorry fuckers…

But I wouldn’t take their job for anything.

To be in that position.

Because.

We live a little while.

And then we die.

And so Camilla Nielsson deserves a Nobel (or at least a can of General Snus)…because she captured REAL, FUCKING LIFE here.

She doesn’t tell you what to think.

She says (in effect): “figure it out”.

Here’s the facts. Figure it out.

“I have seen what I have seen”, wrote Ezra Pound in his second Canto.

I can’t explain it.

Some drumming.

Women making turkey noises.

Weird, macarena dances.

And a little boy gets beaten to death.

All to write a new constitution.

And Douglas Mwonzora is right: Mugabe is evil.

That is a totally valid perspective.

Having seen this film.

[ahh…]

One source.

Never was anything decided on the basis of one source.

But circumstantial runs up against direct.

Very good, Eric Bolling!

And Tony Shaffer was better with MacGuffin.

But that’s just because this is Dossier du cinema.

Not cool enough for diacritics.

One final word…

Mugabe persists from the Soviet era.

Figure it out.

Is he a friend of NATO?

Do the geopolitical math.

Ruminate on AFRICOM.

Pound…was no patriot. Of his own country. In a traditional sense.

And the most I can bring you is this.

This attestation to genius.

The genius of Democrats by Camilla Nielsson.

And the sad face of former Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai…leader of the opposition MDC party.

Sad.

Like his face had been bashed in few too many times.

And maybe we don’t wanna know.

But the cowed look says it all.

And Douglas Mwonzora risks it all.

Three days in jail without food or water. Plus another 18 days to make it a full three weeks.

Mr. Mwonzora.

So calm.

Collected.

That cool we see in Jafar Panahi.

Yes.

You can jail me.

But you will have to thoroughly kill me.

To stop me.

From doing what I love.

-PD

2 Comments

Vredens Dag [1943)

Quarante-et-un. Quarante-deux.

Quarante trois.

Goddamn, life is sad.

This is not a film to be watched once.

And not a film for young minds (though the pearly Lisbeth Movin gausses gossamer every vignette).

Form ever follows function. So sayeth Louis Sullivan.

Your gauss is as good as mien.

Meshes of the afternoon blur her tearstained smile.

Movin’ on up, now.

In evolution. Function ever following form.

Invocation vs. induction.

Carl Friedrich’s magnetic flux density.

88 miles-per-hour for all us schmucks out there.

Who is crazier:

the witches or the witch hunt?

The conspirators or the conspiracy theorists?

Myths overlaid like handiwork upon reality.

So that all of life is misunderstood.

Religion.

Not a theory, but a story.

A hall-of-mirrors lens.

Same.

17th century.

By my watch.

What century you got?

The witch craze.

The accusation frenzy.

Hysteria. Wisteria. Listeria.

Meanwhile, there was a fucking war going on.

Day of Wrath. Dies irae. Rachmaninov obsessed with the downward spiral.

Televised executions.

The Houellebecq method of citation.

Tag and seek.

Luddites invading Fort Meade.

Digital grinders. And grindermen.

That USJFCOM found an enemy at a propitious time.

Inviting Christensen down from Harvard Business School to disrupt.

From Häxan through the Swedish.

Most everything passes through Denmark here.

The last executioner.

The founder (with a Grinder man) of neuro-linguistic programming who was charged with murder.

Age differences in relationships. [Aha! A sesame seed!!]

Pagans. Odin. Wednesday.

Hair parted right down the middle like John Waters’ mustache migrated due north (prove that you’re not a robot).

Professional videogame player?!? Where’s the market for that…

And, of course, The Gambia. No industrial light nor magic there.

White white white.

White man say all good thing come from him.

White man invent every innovation.

White man naturally attracted to white woman.

A Victoria’s Secret Angel with leprosy. Yowzah!

Norwegian jazz. A bit like Utah jazz.

But, most of all, yodelers!

Which is how I got on this string.

The grave importance of string theory.

Because her needlepoint tells a story.

A mother walking hand-in-hand with a son.

But the mother is the younger one.

The two mothers.

One a goddess of archetype.

The other a bored housewife.

You actually have to go back to 1590 for this kind of boredom.

But it comes alive. Kiss.

Thanks to Dreyer. A true auteur. A true Danish genius.

Anna Svierkier acts her flabby behind off.

Thorkild Roose looks like Hume Cronyn in Brewster’s Millions (1985).

Such sad perfection from Sigrid Neiiendam.

It is not the hero role for Preben Lerdorff Rye.

No Ordet, this.

He might be stuck in the bog. Or he might have gone around the bog.

It’s like a bad porno.

But Movin is a star on the order of Adrianna Nicole.

The Blue Bunny.

Brown is the Warmest Color.

Somebody please cast Adrianna Suplick in something.

Suplick? Movin. [Golly.]

Which is to say that Lisbeth Movin fills up the screen like a supernova.

Collapsing. Prolapsing. Yikes…

Her husband cofounded the works at Hellerup.

Ketchup.

Godspeed you b!ack emperor tomato

Spells ALM. And nobody thought code.

Fearsome beauty of genius.

-PD

2 Comments

Ordet [1955)

I’m so scared of life.

So scared of death.

And everything in between.

And so I thank the God of all religions.

My God. Whom I do not own. Not mine alone.

Once, an old lady in a corner taught me how to pronounce Søren Kierkegaard. [Kierka Gourd]

And I delivered a speech of mere seconds…in Denmark…extolling Ordet.

And now we have come full circle.

What was living has died.

And in the spark of a moment is alive again.

That is the miracle of cinema which the auteur theorists captured.

It’s not just the story. It’s how you tell it.

That spark of manipulating the mystery…the seventh art…cinema…that is authorship.

The breath of life.

Magic.

Yes.

Anything can happen in the movies.

Everything is possible.

The mutants receive new life from David Byrne and Luaka Bop captures a situation à la Yves Klein.

Johannes will often spout out nonsense. Seemingly. The insanity of religion.

But few times has the essence of faith been so lovingly portrayed as here.

Certainly Francesco, giullare di Dio. Rossellini. Five years previous.

Yes, the jester of God.

I am here for you. For that very purpose. My sermon. Amen.

Now that we finally have a Pope who espouses omnism.

And there are those who would call him antichrist.

Rubbish!

Be like Peter. Peter Peterson. Reread the words of Jesus.

It’s all a bunch of unimportant bollocks over which we are arguing.

And meanwhile propaganda puts truth at the service of falsehood.

But I’m just a messed up kid.

I’ve studied too much.

Like Johannes.

I’m delusional.

Especially insofar as thinking I can change anything whatsoever.

What faith! What insanity!!

No.

I merely have the heart of Mikkel. The doubter.

And I grow into the form of Morten. The pessimist.

But what about that magic?

That electric guitar with a lightening flash? Perfectly synchronized.

Those behind-the-scenes meanderings of God. A humble god. Not drawing too much attention.

Yes, that is the sentiment of Inger (Birgitte Federspiel).

Everything we have ever loved.

Taken from us.

Goodbye.

And all the while Preben Lerdorff Rye wanders around as if in a trance.

Exactly like Nicolas de Gunzberg in Vampyr.

Exactly like Falconetti in La Passion de Jeanne d’Arc.

And exactly like the mad saints who penned the great maniacal books.

The Gospel of John (Johannes). The Word. Ordet.

And the Book of Revelation. Dangerous plaything of the lonely.

Harmless psychedelia taken literally.

So obviously a bad trip. And what a perfect exclamation of fear to finalize the canon.

And how ironic that the futurists have never heard of Giacomo Balla or Carlo Carrà or even Marinetti himself.

Yes. Not at all ironic.

Dialectic. Socratic method. Devil’s advocate.

Unity of opposites. Heraclitus. Logos.

I say, my good man… The more things change, the more they stay the same.

Harrumph!

Is the auto-antonym flammable or inflammable? Make up your mind!

And cleave TO or diverge like cleavage (literally)?

Which is to say, “defined by its opposite”.

Leadership><Followership.

You’ll end up hating algebra (wink wink).

iff!

(~)

ñot! Borat.

Bathetic (!)

+ or

with black pieces, mind you:

“1.e4 e5 2.f4 Bc5 3.Nf3 d6 4.c3 Bg4 5.Bc4 Nd7 6.h3 Bxf3 7.Qxf3 Qe7 8.a4 a6 9.b4 Ba7 10.Na3 Ngf6 11.f5 c6 12.d3 h6 13.Nc2 Rd8 14.Be3 Bb8 15.O-O Nh7 16.Qg4 Qf8 17.h4 Ndf6 18.Qf3 Qe7 19.g4 d5 20.Bc5 Bd6 21.Bxd6 Qxd6 22.Bb3 O-O 23.Rad1 g5 24.Ne3 Kg7 25.h5 Rfe8 26.Rf2 Nf8 27.Rb2 b5 28.Ra2 d4 29.axb5 axb5 30.Nc2 Ra8 31.Rxa8 Rxa8 32.cxd4 exd4 33.Kg2 N8d7 34.Qf2 Nxg4 35.Qxd4+ Qxd4 36.Nxd4 Ne3+ 37.Kf3 Nxd1 38.Bxd1 Ne5+ 39.Ke3 Ra1 40.Be2 Rb1 41.Nf3 Nxf3 42.Bxf3 Rxb4 43.e5 c5 44.Bc6 Rb1 45.Ke4 b4 46.Kd5 b3 47.Kd6 b2 48.Ke7 Re1 49.f6+ Kg8 50.Be4 Rxe4 51.dxe4 b1=Q 52.Kd6 Qxe4 0–1”

Will easily lead you to a rather insignificant Rousseau.

A social contract for the turnstiles.

◇

“the things that you’re liable/to read in the Bible”

And yet the tearstains remain on my glasses…

Like a day at the beach.

Long ago.

Salty.

I pray this that and the uttering.

The word.

If it be possible.

-PD

4 Comments

Häxan [1922)

One of my ancestors was hung for being a witch.

Susannah Martin.

1692.

When I speak of it or think of it, it gives me chills.

It.

What?

No, she.

As Danish director Benjamin Christensen makes so clear in this masterpiece.

Häxan is Swedish for “witch”.

Our film was released by Svensk Filmindustri: a Swedish film production company which still exists to this day.

Thus the Swedish title. And the Swedish premier(s) in 1922. And the Swedish intertitles.

The Danish would be Heksen.

Swedish, Danish, English…

Bewitched, bothered, and bewildered.

This is the horror of religion. The horror of irrationality. Violence against women. Abuse of the elderly. Mistreatment of the mentally ill.

Christensen’s film is a masterpiece precisely because it combines the clarity of modern thought with the mists of medieval superstition.

It begins almost as a documentary.

Unlike me, he lists his sources.

But then the film takes on a life of its own.

As if the director was not quite sure whether to dismiss superstition outright.

As if some dark Freudian specters were haunting his deliberate phantasmagoria.

It was meant to be a lucid montage.

But the letters became transposed.

Lucid, Lurid. Live. Evil.

Miles Davis had it right. And Howlin’ Wolf (by way of Willie Dixon) [not to mention Howlin’ Pelle].

Svensk Filmindustri. Founded a mere three years before Häxan.

Only fitting that the parent company (Bonnier Group) should have its roots in København.

Because Benjamin Christensen is brilliant as the Devil.

And now for the juicy stuff.

Not Hell, but Hellerup. Denmark.

Birthplace of Stine Fischer Christensen (ooh la la!).

But we’re mainly interested in ASA Filmudlejning.

Or are we?

An unfinished symphony of horror.

…eine Symphonie des Grauens

1922.

Possessed by self-punishment.

“More weight!”

And even more wait.

Tom Waits for no man.

I was tricked.

Must have been needles and pins. Voodoo.

He can’t even remember her name.

Ripped my heart from my chest.

Call it punk rock.

Moloch. Bohemian Grove.

If it’s all a bunch of bollocks, then these blokes are just bluffing, right?

-Bechtel

-H.W.

-Warren Christopher

-George Creel (investigative journalist and propagandist)

-Harlan Crow (this guy…son of Trammell Crow…buddy of Clarence Thomas [more on him later]…Thomas, who gave Crow the Bible of Frederick Douglass [what the fuck?!?]…Crow…owns at least one painting by Hitler…Napoleon’s writing desk…the Duke of Wellington’s sword [ca. 1815]…but weirdest is his Alec Trevelyan (006) / Janus sculpture garden which includes such spoils of war as Lenin, Stalin, Castro, Marx, Mubarak, Tito, Ceausescu, and Guevara)

-Draper

-David Gergen (of course)

-Inman

-Kissinger (naturally)

-John Lehman (9/11 commission)

-Henry S. Morgan (cofounder Morgan Stanley)

-Reagan (Owl’s Nest)

-George Shultz [sick]

-Tony Snow [“]

-Caspar Weinberger

Weaving spiders come not here.

-PD

4 Comments

Vampyr [1932)

I come to you from the darkest place.

Where all hope has been extinguished.

A maze of study and revelation.

Barely a word here spoken.

Do not give me your attention.

I am not the first person.

You wander in this dream.

He comes to know the horror.

Her and her alone.

Climb climb climb from the mist of history.

Give up your secrets to the light.

Vampyr, Kryptos, Tutankhamun.

IQLUSION. 1Q84.

gravity’s rainbow. CERN.

In a Glass Darkly. Published in Ireland. 1872.

Sheridan Le Fanu. Dublin.

Does Langley know about this?

Always candles. Always lighting candles.

NYPVTT. Berlin.

Nicolas de Gunzberg as Julian West as Allan Gray. Got it?

MZFPK. We’re losing time quickly.

At an even pace.

Speeding towards the hour.

As slowly as we’ve ever been.

William H. Webster. The only person to have ever headed both the CIA and the FBI.

Courtempierre. Loiret.

Ah! The review…

As if waking from a dream.

Or falling back into a nightmare.

Placing one foot in front of the other.

Rena Mandel could have come straight from Nosferatu.

Like Greta Schröder. 1922. 1932.

Not flapper like Frances Dade. Blonde on blonde. Helen Chandler.

UFA wanted Dracula to come out first.

A strange tactic.

And then utter failure.

But Sybille Schmitz has that Nazi jawline. Like Leni Riefenstahl.

Spoonsful of tea for a dying man.

Candles peer in through the glass.

And the camera stares upwards…at the swaying trees.

It is like Nobody Died at Sandy Hook.

To be opened after my death.

Sealed in wax thrice.

Submission is the only slow number.

Mid-tempo. A revelation. Talisman.

A crooked doctor. And you’re giving blood.

They’re putting you on statins.

The drug companies will pay. And general practitioners will have impunity whoring for big pharma.

A view to a kill.

Berlin. Surrounded by East Germany.

Mengenlehreuhr. Yale.

Ooga booga.

Buried alive in the blues.

Come spend a life in Texas.

With no one.

Come be abandoned in Texas.

Not even on the island.

Information warfare.

He is getting his message out desperately.

Franz Liszt as Marguerite Chopin.

No comment from Gounod.

Walpurgisnacht.

Nerval translated 1828.

Gretchen. Margaret. Marguerite.

Ettersberg. Buchenwald.

We see why Godard became suspicious.

Because all but the Dutch declined Resnais’ solicitation for holocaust footage.

Inside the camps.

During the war.

By the most technologically-advanced civilization in terms of film production.

Obsessive-compulsive documenters of expenditures.

The problem with the gas chambers.

Sybille Schmitz looks like a raving lunatic.

The ecstasy of Stockholm syndrome. A bank. Those doe eyes and bearded hippie among the safe-deposit boxes.

The Goethe Oak at Buchenwald. THE Goethe Oak? George Washington slept here.

The Goethe Oak bombed by the Allies.

Now a concrete stump thanks to the DDR.

Goethe Eiche.

Janus-faced Germany. Januskopfes Deutschland. Sounds like a load of rubbish to me.

Schiller’s beech tree didn’t bite the dust till 2007.

Death by flour.

I’ll say it again: Wikipedia’s masterpiece. “List of unusual deaths”.

-PD

4 Comments

Deutschland im Jahre Null [1948)

The first thing film critics have to get right is the title.

Let me explain a bit.

On my site, I always list a film in its original language (to the best of my ability).

In my opinion, that is the best way of honoring the film.

So far, I have encountered the mild idiosyncrasies of Romanian, Serbo-Croat, Czech, and Polish in addition to the mind-blowing intricacy of Farsi and Japanese.

But with Deutschland im Jahre Null we are seeing a German-language film by an Italian director…sort of.

Italy has a very peculiar tradition concerning voiceovers and direct (or, conversely, indirect) sound. It is an oddity which caught the attention of Godard in his role as film historian.

I cannot give you as erudite an explanation as my hero Jean-Luc, but suffice it to say that foreign (non-Italian) films in Italy have traditionally been overdubbed into Italian. So, in other words, no subtitles.

This is distinct from an American viewer watching a Fellini film. The “American” version (whether on DVD or as a film print in a theater) will be in Italian with subtitles in English. This goes for almost all foreign-language (non-English) films marketed in the United States.

But getting back to Deutschland im Jahre Null… It is similar to the Danish director Carl Th. Dreyer directing the French film La Passion de Jeanne d’Arc…with one major difference. Dreyer’s film was a silent one (the only French being the intertitles). Rossellini’s Deutschland im Jahre Null is very much in German. We are hearing German actors speak (exclusively) German dialogue.

What is most interesting is the linguistic lineage of this film. In English, this film is known as:

Germany, Year Zero

Which is quite similar to Rossellini’s preceding masterpiece (in linguistic parallel):

Rome, Open City

To be fair, let’s consider the Italian name (the real name) of Rome, Open City: Roma città aperta. Fine. That is the way I recognize the film. The true name is (in my mind) Roma città aperta.

But with Deutschland im Jahre Null we come to a very strange case. If we do not recognize the primacy of its English title (Germany, Year Zero), and I do not, then we are directed by that great arbiter of cultural legitimacy Wikipedia to consider our options exhausted by being cognizant of the Italian title (Germania anno zero).

What is the message of this omission by English Wikipedia? I believe the message is that Germany was (and continues to be) a null. A zero. A conquered culture.

We see a similar thing in the kowtowing stereotype of conquered Japan. And though Japan might be experiencing some moderate-to-light financial troubles in recent years, Germany is by all accounts the economic powerhouse of continental Europe. Why do I bring economics into the discussion? Because wealthy nations are able to assert themselves.

But let us step back a bit. Wikipedia does have some tasty morsels of information concerning this film. If the source can be trusted, this 1948 film was not shown in Germany (the country from whence the language of the film takes its name) until 1952. After its single screening in München (Munich), it was not heard from again within those borders until it ran on German television in 1978.

Wow…26 years. Either this film was grossly misunderstood, or it was understood all too well. From my reading, this is a very pro-German document.

Rossellini was not George Stevens making concentration camp propaganda. Roberto was making art. The sign of art is the admission of possibilities. Art seduces us because it is subtle. Art does not proclaim in blanket statements. Art does not underestimate the intelligence of the viewer.

Roberto Rossellini did something with his “war films trilogy” which seems to have been unprecedented. The desire of neorealism was to film fiction as if it were documentary. This fiction would be, likewise, based on reality.

But why is it, then, that we have very different views of Roberto Rossellini and Robert Flaherty?

I will tell you my guess. Flaherty’s sin was in the framing of his presentation. To wit, he presented his staged documentaries (take the oil industry propaganda piece Louisiana Story for instance) as if they were naturally-occurring, spontaneous documentaries. The sin, then, was his duplicitous relationship with his subjects. He actively made his human subjects into actors.

Rossellini takes a different tack. There is no pretense that Deutschland im Jahre Null is an ACTUAL documentary. It merely has the feel of that medium. Likewise, Rossellini’s use of nonprofessional actors was likely more of a precursor to Robert Bresson than a twist on Flaherty’s bizarre formula (which predated Roberto in both Nanook of the North [1922] and Man of Aran [1934]). No, Rossellini had created something new.

It’s not so much the films of Flaherty to which I object as it is the idea of them. At least one of his concoctions (perhaps thanks to director F.W. Murnau) is very fine indeed: Tabu [1931]. Flaherty and Murnau co-wrote this ostensible documentary. Indeed, with Flaherty we come into contact with inchoate, obscure film genres such as docudrama, docufiction, fictional documentary (ethnofiction), etc. etc. etc.

Most importantly, none of what I have written here has even scratched the surface of Deutschland im Jahre Null. What ever became of the heartrending main child actor Edmund Moeschke? I do not know.

One thing is certain to me: no film before Rossellini’s “war trilogy” (Roma città aperta, Paisà, and Deutschland im Jahre Null) [1945/1946/1948] takes on such politically sensitive and important topics in such a raw way. The closest would be the socialism of Eisenstein or the humanism of Chaplin.

It is, therefore, no wonder at all that Rossellini spawned a million “new waves” the world over.

-PD

1 Comment

L’Avventura [1960)

Was Monica Vitti the most beautiful woman ever?

Probably.

Is Monica Vitti the most beautiful woman ever?

Yes.

That sounds better.

This.

This is the most disorienting film I have ever seen.

Mulholland Dr. is child’s play in this regard.

A sort of sweet, pleasant nausea.

A feeling I didn’t know existed.

Maybe.

Maybe John Hughes was right in this regard.

[Vingt regards]

uno

hair, always hair…blowing in the wind…like tall grass

good lord…

due

the birds are men…flocking on the jungle gym bars…as she silently tries to sneak from the schoolhouse

Noto…UNESCO World Heritage Site…Samba de Uma Nota Só

tre

a purring in my headphones…a Foley artist diabolico-subliminal…and yes she curls up like a cat…

Quattro

she seems to be bathing in money…but it’s just the floor pattern…sometimes…the floor looks best in red…

and there is always a woman…or a man…and you hate to admit it

cinque

dreadful…dreary…making love above the cemetery…a gazelle with blond hair…thank you Google…5’7″…an essential function for the, functioning of humanity

sei

Uh! They’re all nudes. No nudity here. A goddess is clothed. Not an alabaster ornament by the fountain.

sette

I wanted to like it. Or I wanted to not like it. Camus. I said that.

otto

no man is an island…and no island a man…and no man a nomad…

nove

it all hinges (henges) on a funny face in the mirror…the genius…we create together…Vitti…Antonioni…Ferzetti

a bad habit I never caught…

dieci

andiamo…lots of andiamo…remarkable for a film with so little movement in such a big slab of its meat…

like formidable in French…Anna Karina…everything formidable…but that’s because she was Danish…speaking French…and her cute little accent…but before there was Godard Breathless there was Antonioni Adventure…like the second Television album…but moreover on Karina…before Vivre sa vie (I know…) there was L’Avventura…a little scene with a wig…and before that Louise Brooks…

undici

you think they will turn around nude

dodici

Nono, Luigi…it is the most intoxicating kiss…out of nowhere…WTF in excelsis…mamma mia!

tredici

David, del…frolicking…who says summer is over?!? bangs…Fiat…leaping off the pavement (!)

quattordici

they told me to learn…sotto voce…or sotto nightgown…les cloches…loaves…and fishes…twenty, or vingt-et-un…Van Johnson…I really blew it…the architecture…and a dog with lunar metabolism…

quindici

you fuck…and then get fucked…that is, the circle of life…like a lion…and an impala…gazelle…przygoda…

sedici

he collects dolls…a man…faints [Truffaut]

diciassette

the first girl…is not Vitti…wait a while…count the seconds

diciotto

oops…now comes the swimming in money…my house in Rome…and the other in Milan

diciannove

Michelangelo…Sandro…I threw it all away…and no one is listening

venti

another day, another dollar…pardon me ma’am, but do you have natural nails? I use a lighter. Better still, until they go wrong.

it’s too packed full of dolphins

too many Bibles and Catholic eeriness

spring breakers…island hoppers

if it had ended

just give me macaroons and sports cars

il mio amore

-PD

6 Comments

paulydeathwish

cinema dossier

Tag Archives: Danish

No Time to Die [2021)

Stieg Larssons Millennium: Del 1 [2010)

Romancing the Stone [1984)

Vredens Dag [1943)

Häxan [1922)

Deutschland im Jahre Null [1948)

L’Avventura [1960)