Letters sent and not sent

by Ryland Walker Knight

Though of course I would have loved to receive a review copy of the Letters from Fontainhas box set, for whatever reason I ultimately did not. This is not really a problem, to be honest, because I feel it's a certain duty of mine to buy the box. Or, I want to. That is, I learned a lot a couple years ago when Costa visited the PFA and I hope I can learn a few more things looking back at these films presented this way (instead of the, um, illicit way). Granted, these aren't exactly party pictures, and they aren't my favorite (that'd be Où gît votre sourire enfoui?), but they will be a fine addition to my nerd collection. Once I do get around to watching them, I will likely write a few more words about what it means to watch them now at this remove. That is, I want to see how time has shaped me as much as these people, since that's a definite part of the project at hand: the change in Vanda, and her cough, is one of the most obvious lines to trace aside from Costa's evolution as an image-maker, which I like to see as going from somewhat classical, everything's a bit perfect, to a grimey pragmatism, which renders a different and steady beauty, to a new realm of myth expressionism that makes shadows (and spot-lights) colors of time and character. I'll try to elucidate that when the time comes.

Speaking of letters from places, like home and not home, my still-mint Ackerman set needs watching, too, come to think of it, and that might just happen soonish. Heck, I may even buy that Gadamer book while I'm at it, since I added it to the widget at right, along with the trilogy and Close-Up and the Brakhage anthology (both Blu Ray). Which is to say that I think a Blu Ray player of some kind (perhaps the gaming kind) may be on my May birthday horizon.

[Top image stolen from Glenn, purveyor of delicious lasagna and, along with His Lovely Wife, an altogether generous host for a late Easter evening meal. Second image stolen from that invaluable blog the art of memory.]

Make tomorrow yesterday, love ice and sun

by Ryland Walker Knight

—Click for treats
Sunday afternoon I learned about The Field. First thought: How could this dude elude me for so long? Mostly my fault, if we want to say fault, since I don't exactly go looking for music the same way I used to at the start of our last decade (ie, read Pfork). However, how come it took somebody new to hip me to this? Turns out my friends all already thought I was hip to it. They just figured I wouldn't need a nudge in this direction because it suits my musical temperament so well. That is, it has its pop roots—it's dance music after all, there's a cover of "Everybody's Got To Learn Sometime" on the newer record—but it's weird and illegible enough to intrigue other parts of my brain. Dance music, and minimal dance music at that, gets a bad rap for being "repetitive" but that's precisely where the fun lies. Not just because it builds a beat to vibe with and dance to but also because repetition is an order to play with just like anything else: the differences, exciting and terrible and awesome and so many things, emerge over time. Put otherwise: these two albums have been on repeat a lot because they tickle my brain as much as my sides; they stimulate concepts up top and feelings below in the body. (This was also my so-called "over-intellectualized" argument in favor of Midtown 120 Blues last fall, too.)

Also, for all my love of Cut Copy and Pavement and Prince and any other wacky pop, I'm pretty into minimal-architectural sounds that arrange a space (a field!) of play. For a long time all I did was listen to Fennesz. That was like living in a cave, however, and putting The Field on repeat is like living a perpetual drive across the Golden Gate bridge with the sunroof open and not minding the fog's chill because you know there's sunshine ahead.

—Suits living West of it all, too
This also gave me good reason to update the widget after a long time off that tip. I've added the two albums that headline this post, the Cavell book we should all be reading together, and two of the best American films last year (The Informant! and Fantastic Mr. Fox), about which I'll have more to say in the not-too-distant future in other outlets. As ever, thanks for reading, and for any Amazon purchases you make (I know there are some of you out there indulging/helping me! and that's great!), and, duh, stay tuned for more. Heaven knows that I'll be around, maxin' with or without socks, dreaming about words and sequenced spaces.

Bunch your matter and count the pages.

by Ryland Walker Knight

Back to widget time. Really. Just want to sell some books, even if this internet thing is part of the reason why lovable stores like Black Oak (and Cody's, of course) are long gone. So, here's some stuff you should read, and probably own, if you haven't/don't already, along with some quick plugs for some DVDs (released and yet to be released) that I'll be bringing up and blogging about, again, in greater depth, soon. Cough:

• As inspired by his recent Fresh Air interview, which was amazing for how moving it was on top of how hilarious it was, I want to nod at what Tracy Morgan was helping sell: his memoir, I Am the New Black.
  


• Since I took off that Library of America collection, but couldn't leave off my man, here's a plug for the paperback I own of Pale Fire, which may be the best book ever.
  


• Georges Perec's Species of Spaces is pretty phenomenal, as is most of his work, and this Penguin edition is an affordable introduction to one of the great Oulipo brains (and hairdos) to create language fun full of wit and smarts. I think I like Perec more than Queneau, if that matters.
  


• Coming out of Bright Star the other day, I spent a lot of energy thinking about how much I wanted to read all kinds of Keats. I did not buy any, and may not yet, but I may check this Complete Poems and Selected Letters put out by Modern Library Classics. [Update: You can also get the poems, all of them, for free right here.] The Brawne-inspired poem that gives Campion her title is quite lovely, and Ben Whishaw reads it well; recites it well, too, laid against Abbie Cornish's breast. Still thinking about the film...
  


• And, for good measure, here's some movies I'll be writing about shortly: from The Criterion Collection, Wim Wender's perhaps-pinnacle (or a high point never touched again?), Wings of Desire, and Chantal Akerman's seminal structuralist block of routine-art that couches feminist politics inside a maze of linoleum and potatoes, Jeanne Dielman, 23 Quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles; from the long-lost file (also the terrible art direction file), John Huston's final film, The Dead, adapted from James Joyce's short story of the same name (itself the final story of its Dubliners book), which I've recently re-read.

Cosmic calls in on us, again.

by Ryland Walker Knight

I'd planned on letting that last widget post lapse past the page, but, well, this early AM I got excited about some more recommendations from my daily dials. The coding on the widget is a little wonky, but, still, I'm updating it. Here goes. Most immediate would be that I just finished watching Criterion's Renoir box set of films from the 1950s, Stage and Spectacle, and I cannot sing its praises enough. Not only are the films all delightful, and typically excellent, but spread across the three discs is the interview Jacques Rivette conducted with le maitre, called "Jean Renoir parle de son art," which has as many lessons about cinema (and art in general) as you'll get in a full semester of study. Essential viewing. Likewise, Bill Callahan's Woke on a Whaleheart has been getting a bunch of spins around these parts. I'm going to have to return my library copy of Infinite Jest this week and hope to pick up another copy at my next local, but you can certainly buy one because it's worth it; I'd just rather spend that $12 on some food right now. Or, I could put it towards a copy of that new Farber on Film behemoth (which Glenn wrote a few words about over here). Finally, in my haze yesterday, browsing around (somewhere, anywhere), I learned that the Blu Ray release of 2001: A Space Odyssey is currently being sold at a staggering discount, which is another disc I'd love to own along with the requisite player. Can't beat 70mm at the Castro, but it's better than standard def on a tube. Some day soon, we can hope!

— There's sap in the trees if you tap'm
10.06.09: Added five more things to give the lil box two pages of fun stuff. Quickly: (1) Nabokov: Novels 1955-1962: Lolita / Pnin / Pale Fire for the greatest 20th Century novelist's most recognizably seminal works; (2) That FatCat reissue of Spirit They're Gone, Spirit They've Vanished + Danse Manitee for how those wacky Bmore guises got started; (3) The Cary Grant Box Set (Holiday / Only Angels Have Wings / The Talk of the Town / His Girl Friday / The Awful Truth) for the best Hollywood actor of all time in some of the best Hollywood pictures of all time; (4) A Christmas Tale for being the best picture of what I feel about families, and mine (with more words soon upon this DVD's release); and (5) the game of Scattergories for all the fun it's brought me through the years.

Whistle while you widget

by Ryland Walker Knight

I don't have a license to sell you these.
After reading Shoals' relaunch of the FD widget earlier today, I asked him if he thought I'd do well to follow suit and bring some Amazonian presence back to my sidebar. The chat, though quick, was thorough, or thorough enough, and lead to the inevitable "Why not?" conclusion. It doesn't look too tacky, and if I make a feature out of it, writing little blurbs every now and again, maybe you'll be so kind as to start your Amazon purchases here, at VINYL IS HEAVY, so we (that is, I) can get a teeny-tiny kick-back every month. You know the drill: every bit helps in this economy! The occasional link here and there—and my old suggestion buttons at the bottom of the old sidebar in the old layout—brought in some unexpected and welcome beer money, and now that we're getting more eyes than ever, I thought, why not take up that old shameless shilling tag and put it to good use.

For our first batch of recommendations, we have some obvious VINYL favorites. And, note, that even if you don't buy any of these items, and buy something else, like, say, Gossip Girl Season 1 on DVD, you'll still be helping out if you start here. Thus, in no particular order, here's what we're hocking/highlighting:

• The New World: The Extended Cut on Blu-Ray. I don't have a Blu-Ray player, or a PS3, but if I did this would be the first disc I'd buy because, as many of you may know, it's one of my favorite movies ever, and possibly my second-favorite film of this decade we're ending. It's gorgeous. And the disc is super cheap, which is a bonus. You can read more of my thoughts back at The House Next Door.
  
  
• Stanley Cavell's The World Viewed, which I lost only two weeks into the new year on an A-train back to Bed-Stuy from a screening of the mostly-skipped-over California Dreamin, which is a fine little film that my buddy Keith Uhlich likes a great deal. At any rate, Cavell's book is seminal for my thinking. And I've leaned on it, not Bazin, for much of my ontological thoughts about the image. Here's our Stanley Cavell tag.
  
  
• Manuel Göttsching's E2-E4, which I first mentioned in the first-ever convergence back on Feb 28th, 2009. It's a bit pricey, since it's only available as an import, but, man, it's something special. The beginnings of so much cool stuff, including LCD Soundsystem's indelible 45:33 mix (according to Wikipedia).
  
  
• Arthur Russell's Love is Overtaking Me, which was compiled and released last year, which I made mention of back at this post. If you're feeling blue, or you want someone to touch you in your ears on your way inside, to your heart, maybe, then give this long-player a spin. The title track alone is worth the world.
  
  
• The one, the only, the massive, the hilarious: Don Quixote. I've been reading Edith Grossman's translation for a couple months now thanks to a gift from my dad and, boy, this thing is a hoot. Sure, it's big and it'll eat up your time, and you'll be committing to an undertaking, but don't think of it that way: think of all the jokes you get on every page, in every sentence. And Grossman's translation is rightly renowned for its readability (and footnotes).

—Sure do love you out there!