HWY: An American Pastoral (1969)

HWY: An American Pastoral was made by the singer songwriter Jim Morrison of the famous late 60s Los Angeles band The Doors and his friends, drinking buddies and drug pals. As a film HWY is a fairly boring way to spend 51 minutes and 7 seconds. It is, as Morrison himself said, not really about anything. It features the familar image of Morrison waking up in the semi-desert (Charlie Manson style) beside a lively stream, he stumbles over the rocks with the grace of a wounded armadillo and then makes his way to the city by hitchiking. At 22 mins a dying dog is encountered on the highway by Morrison who is so moved by its howls he steals a car and drinks a beer (or has he killed a person..hard to know). Screaming as he drives away.

As a historical document it is today interesting. HWY embodies the late 1960s loose, counter culture with its chauvenistic masculinity, romantic naturism, car worship, flavored with visual appreciation of landscapes and the perceived freedoms of the open road. The sound track is a good with some nice remixes present, including Morrison's spoken words that later were used on the An American Prayer album. The film itself has a remix feel to it with random sequences shot as Jim and his firends drive through the desert towards LA, stopping as gas stations and taking in the views, graffiti and general decay and extreams of the city. Late hippie flowers baking in the sun.

HWY: An American Pastoral, a project he started in 1969. Morrison financed the venture and formed his own production company in order to maintain complete control of the project. Paul Ferrara, Frank Lisciandro and Babe Hill assisted with the project. Morrison played the main character, a hitchhiker turned killer/car thief. Morrison asked his friend, composer/pianist Fred Myrow, to select the soundtrack for the film. Wikipedia

I must confess here that when I was 19 years old I was a Doors fan. That was long time ago, although I still listen to them now and then.

Japanorama - Gyaru

Ganguro is an alternative fashion trend among young Japanese women which peaked in popularity around the year 2000, but remains evident today. The Shibuya and Ikebukuro districts of Tokyo are the center of ganguro fashion.

In ganguro fashion, a deep tan is combined with hair dyed in shades of orange to blonde, or a silver gray known as "high bleached". Black ink is used as eyeliner and white concealer is used as lipstick and eyeshadow. False eyelashes, plastic facial gems, and pearl powder are often added to this. Platform shoes and brightly-colored outfits complete the ganguro look. Also typical of ganguro fashion are tie-dyed sarongs, miniskirts, and lots of bracelets, rings, and necklaces.

The deep ganguro tan is in direct conflict with traditional Japanese ideas of feminine beauty. Due to this, as well as their use of slang, unconventional fashion sense, and perceived lack of hygiene, ganguro gals are almost always portrayed negatively by the Japanese media.

Fashion magazines like Egg and Cawaii have had a direct influence on the ganguro. Other popular ganguro magazines include Popteen and Ego System. The ganguro culture has evolved its own synchronized dances, called Para Para. Participants do predetermined moves at the same time, usually as accompaniment to J-pop music. Para Para events are held by ganguro circles, and involve either going to clubs to perform Para Para or gathering to learn new dances.

People generally associate the ganguro look with the old style. The newer style consists of a mid tan, natural makeup, long white to brown hair, with curls or straightened and backcombed. Current clothing trends include mini shorts, knee socks, and tanktops.

One of the most famous early ganguro girls was known as Buriteri, nicknamed after the black soy sauce used to flavor yellowtail fish in teriyaki cooking. Egg made her a star by frequently featuring her in its pages during the height of the ganguro craze. After modeling and advertising for the Shibuya tanning salon "Blacky", social pressure and negative press convinced Buriteri to retire from the ganguro lifestyle

Yamanba is a newer term often used to describe extreme practitioners of ganguro fashion. Yamanba feature darker tans and add white lipstick, pastel eye makeup, tiny metallic or glittery adhesives below the eyes, brightly-colored contact lenses, plastic dayglo-colored clothing, and incongruous accessories to the ganguro look. Some yamanba wear stuffed animals as decorations. The male equivalent is called a "center guy" (Sentaagai?, Center Street), a pun on the name of a pedestrian shopping street near Shibuya Station in Tokyo where yamanba and center guys are often seen.

The making of 'The Proposition'

The making of 'the proposition', a film written by nick cave and directed by john hillcoat with guy pearce, ray winstone. italian subtitles.

Demokracy by Abjeez

Dub reggae from Iran by Abjeez

abjee (aab.gee)

Persian slang for sister ... and that’s just what they are - Safoura and Melody Safavi.

Backed by a colorful crew of musicians, the two abjee’s present their own original brand of Persian world pop!

Their lyrics, often humorous and sometimes rebellious, are written in Farsi, but the expressive groove of the music and the abjees’ dramatic delivery break down all language barriers to create a new synthesis of cultures.

Blood of the Poet (1930)

The Blood of A Poet from UMSchoolOfCommunication on Vimeo.

There has never been a film like Le Sang d'un Poete (Blood of a Poet). It was not only the first film made by Cocteau, one that ignited another satisfying scandal, but it brought all his diverse talents into focus in a medium that was new to him. The work represents an aesthetic milestone in Cocteau's career.
The idea of a film had its germination during a house party given by Charles and Marie-Laure de Noailles at Hyeres in 1929. Georges Auric, Cocteau's lifelong musical collaborator, surprised his hosts by announcing that he wanted to compose the score for an animated cartoon. Cocteau was asked on the spot to provide a scenario. After some discussion, the Noailles agreed to give Cocteau a million francs to make a real film with a score by Auric. This became The Blood of a Poet, still one of the most widely viewed of all Cocteau's screenworks. Cocteau described its disturbing series of voyeuristic tableaux as "a descent into oneself, a way of using the mechanism of the dream without sleeping, a crooked candle, often mysteriously blown out, carried about in the night of the human body."
Technically, The Blood of a Poet reflects Cocteau's trials and errors as a novice filmmaker who had to turn irreversible mistakes to his advantage and improvise every celluloid foot of the way. During shooting, he used the dust raised by studio cleaning men to enhance the mysterious atmosphere of the final scenes. Special weightless effects were obtained by camera trickery to show the little girl flying up to the ceiling and the poet moving painfully along the corridor wall. Once Cocteau discovered that he could turn shooting disasters into happy accidents, he was off on a career of making films that carried his cachet of surprises: the miraculous mirror and mercury scene in Orphee, he live arms holding candlebra from he walls of La Belle et la Bete, and the accelerated time sequences of flowers opening in Le Testament d'Orphee are only a few of his trucs.

Dragnet: The Big Seventeen (1952)

Dragnet, starring our favorite TV cop, Jack Webb as Sgt. Joe Friday. In this episode The Big Seventeen. Joe is working hard to find a 17 year old kid who has a stolen a bunch of high grade heroin. If he starts selling it to other kids Joe fears a lot of kids will overdose on the uncut drugs. But the police are too late, and the kid who stole the drugs dies of a drug overdose. Overall, a terrific Dragnet episode also features an interesting part where the kids went crazy and trashed the movie theater. And the owner turns over a little box filled with drugs to Joe. What's in the box? Two joints of marijuana. Is that what I think it is. I am not wrong am I?? Joe responds ? No sir, no mistake, it marijuana. Weed of insanity.

Glastonbury Fayre 1971

Documentary film presented by The Late Shift on the 1971 Glastonbury Festival - 1 hr 27 min. More info at UK Rockfestivals
One of the most legendary and mystical festivals held in the Uk, the second Glastonbury Festival was held to coincide with the summer ... all » solstice - mainly because of the deeply held beliefs of the organizers - who instead of being hard faced promoters - were pretty much immersed in the pudding of mysticism. In this sense they were far more in tune with their potential audience than those who were only into promoting festivals to make money. Those who attended this bash attest that this was something out of the ordinary, the festival transcended the usual obstacles to having a great time.

The weather was, for a British 'summer' - very good, there were no major hassles from locals, the police or health inspectors. It shows how, given the right circumstances, a music festival could really break through the conventional barriers that regulate behaviour and which prevent us from really being ourselves. This was one of the rare UK festivals where the British reserve was truly dissolved and almost everyone let their hair down, the barriers between audience and performers melted, at times they became one and the film attests to the truth of this happening, its the only film of a British rock festival which is truly uplifting .Possibly one reason for this was that the event was only attended by about 7,000, and was more or less free, being subsidised by a coterie of well heeled heads.

The film is a mix of performances by musical artists, along with extensive footage of the attendees enjoying the festival.
Arthur Brown's Kingdom Come - All forms and distinctions.
Family - Drowned in wine.
Fairport Convention - Dirty linen.
Gong - Tried so hard.
Linda Lewis.
Michael Magic.
Melanie - Peace will come (according to plan).
Quintessence - Giants.
Terry Reid (with Linda Lewis) - Dean.
Traffic - Gimme some lovin'.
Trumpton and the Riots.
Tonto's Expanding Head Band.

WE MUST NAME THE SYSTEM

We Must Name The System: Paul Potter 1965/2007 from Mark Tribe on Vimeo.

Public reenactment of a speech given by Paul Potter, former President of the Students for a Democratic Society (SDS), at the April 17, 1965 March on Washington. Potter offers an insightful critique of our government’s use of the rhetoric of freedom to justify war, and calls for citizens of the United States to create a massive social movement to build a “democratic and humane society in which Vietnams are unthinkable.” Max Bunzel, a Washington D.C.-based actor delivered the speech on location on July 26, 2007. This five-minute video is based on a 29 minute speech.

 Quotes:

"We must name that system. We must name it, describe it, analyze it, understand it and change it. For it is only when that system is changed and brought under control that there can be any hope for stopping the forces that create a war in Vietnam today or a murder in the South tomorrow or all the incalculable, innumerable more subtle atrocities that are worked on people all over all the time."

"How do you stop a war then? If the war has its roots deep in the institutions of American society, how do you stop it? Do you march to Washington? Is that enough? Who will hear us? How can you make the decision makers hear us, insulated as they are, if they cannot hear the screams of a little girl burnt by napalm?"

The Birthday Party - Fear Of Gun/Hamlet(Pow Pow Pow)

Birthday Party
Live - unknown venue
28.02.1983
One of the finest musical groups ever fashioned under the Australian sun....

Joe Coleman

"Joe Coleman (b. 1955) has been known through the last decades as an "infernal machine", a "fish-fucking satanist" and by the Charles Manson qoute "Joe Coleman is a caveman in a spaceship!". His early days as a wild and unhinged performance artist were documented in the Re/Search "Pranks!" book, which hardly mentioned that he was a painter. Later, his paintings has reached a large audience and fan base through cover art for many of the Amok and Feral House books, like "You Can't Win" and "Apocalypse Culture". Also, the two Coleman "solo" books "Cosmic Retribution" and "Original Sin" gives a great and impressive view into his visuals. The former also includes his early b&w illustrations of the life stories of the killer Carl Panzram and the travelling hobos Boxcar Bertha and Jack Black. Nowadays he's doing paintings that requires him to use a magnifying lens and brushes that are down to just one hair. When seeing his work reproduced, one imagines that the paintings are huge, but they're actually only 20 to 25 inches wide.

What Coleman does is often called "outsider art". The original term was "art brut", and referred to mentally disturbed artists like the unschooled and schizophrenic Adolf Wölfli (1864-1930), who started painting at the age of 31, after being institutionalized for raping a 5 year old girl. The term "outsider art" today encompasses all sorts of intuitive, visionary art, self-taught art and contemporary folk art. The main characteristics of outsider art according to the experts are "dense ornamentation", "compulsively repeated patterns", "enigmatic calligraphy" and "wayward symmetry". All of this certainly applies to Coleman's work, but Coleman is also separate from the "outsiders" because he has some formal education, a huge knowledge of art history and an acute awareness of his own psychology." by Jan Bruun