You are browsing the Blog for Films Archives - Page 3 of 5 - Marja-Leena Rathje.

← Previous Entries
Next Entries →
by Marja-Leena

a low-carb diet

Thanks to an email alert from the local Finnish community, last night my husband and I enjoyed an interesting creative documentary film on CBC Newsworld’s Passionate Eye:

RECIPES FOR DISASTER, a Millennium Film of Finland production, directed by John Webster, in its first public screening.

What happens when a determined young family gives up all oil-based products for a year?
Filmmaker John Webster and his family decided to own up to their transgressions and kick their addiction to oil. They committed to a one-year “oil detox”. It’s quite simple really: the family will go on with their suburban lives, but without using any fossil fuels, driving cars or flying in airplanes. They won’t buy anything packaged in plastic like food, makeup, shampoo, toothpaste or kids’ toys. This last item proves a particular challenge to Webster’s two young sons.



Recipes for Disaster shows that at the core of the impending climate catastrophe are those little failures that we as individuals make every day, and which are so much a part of human nature. And a lot of it has to do with oil consumption.



This charming and intimate “family drama” reveals the overwhelming challenge the Webster’s have taken on. But despite the initial shocks, by using logic, sound judgement and common sense, this family does what it takes to combat the existing recipes for disaster that we all blindly follow.

We were surprised and delighted to hear Finnish, spoken mostly by the wife (with English captioning) and to see familiar Finnish landscapes. The film is often quite funny, such as the image of a man’s huge belly with the declaration that it was time to go on a low-carb (carbon not carbohydrate) diet! In one almost tragicomic scene, Webster on leaving the oil-guzzling motor behind, rows his family on their boat for many hours to their summer cottage and is frequently asked by passing boaters if he needed help. The film brought the issues of climate change into the personal realm without the heavy-handedness of some other climate change films.

Check the film’s website as to when and where the film is being shown again and if you have the opportunity, do watch it!


P.S. I was also reminded of the even-broader efforts of the No Impact Man.
Oh, and check out the many comments at CBC !

UPDATE: Feb.20, 2008. Some of you may be interested that the CBC Documentaries Moderator has offered this information:
We’re sorry but we don’t have the necessary rights in order to offer Recipes for Disaster online or on YouTube.
We’re told that a DVD will be available soon. Please contact the distributor in Germany at:
email: info@deckert-distribution.com
website: www.deckert-distribution.com
We do hope the repeat the film during our repeat season in later spring/summer. Please check www.cbc.ca/docs for updated schedule information!

February 18, 2008 in Current Events, Environment, Films, Finland, Estonia & Finno-Ugric by Marja-Leena 8 Comments »

by Marja-Leena

colours of music

DieFrauPerformance.jpg

Can music have colour? David Hockney thought so, as filmmaker Maryte Kavaliauskas shows in her profile for PBS’s American Masters, David Hockney: The Colors of Music.

Hockney designed sets for perfomances of some of the world’s great operas for more than 30 years, surreal backdrops of “purple forests, spacey blues, giant blocks and mad silhouettes.” Kavaliauskas’ film features excerpts from operas by Mozart, Stravinsky, Ravel and Puccini, and the result is a mesmerizing, occasionally dizzying scherzo of sound and colour.

Ironically, Hockney suffered from gradual but steadily deteriorating hearing loss late in life – a decline documented in the program. “I have always said how a hearing loss makes you aware of space, visually,” Hockney says in the film. “I became aware of that…I am aware.” And how. David Hockney: The Colors of Music is a feast for the eyes. (PBS – 10 p.m.)
– Alex Strachan, The Vancouver Sun, Page C6 (print only), July 18, 2007. (Links added by me.)

A TV program on my favourite subjects, visual art and opera, and a famous artist as well!

I read the above in our paper this morning and was happy to note that the program is available on one of our basic cable channels (unlike another art program). I rarely watch TV because I don’t often know when something really good is on. I detest skimming through pages of tiny uninformative print in the TV listings for over a hundred channels, most of which we don’t receive. So, I’m pleased when I see something like this written up to alert me. I’ll be watching it this evening, and hopefully will update later on as to what I think of it. Some readers may have seen this film already as it is a couple of years old. If not, check your local PBS listings (Canada and US).

Meanwhile, there are interesting links at David Hockney: The Colors of Music website for more information, such as about the people involved like Lithuanian born Maryte Kavaliauskas and the lovely photos of stage sets (above is the performance still from Die Frau Ohne Schatten.) This production reminds me a little of Visual Music.

UPDATE July 19th 10:00 am: I enjoyed the film very much and I’m glad I taped it to view again. It was very interesting to listen to Hockney talk about the challenges of working in a new area that is very 3D instead of his usual 2D and working with light, and how stage design is a collaboration with compromises. I loved the snippets of music and dress rehearsals, such as Erik Satie’s Parade. Hockney says music is heightened poetry and heightened experience. His comments on slowly going deaf were enlightening; he doesn’t like background music, only foreground music – when you just listen to it! Amazing how many times I nodded in agreement. Oh, there’s more but you will just have to see it for yourself!

July 18, 2007 in Films, Music, Other artists by Marja-Leena 7 Comments »

by Marja-Leena

Power of Art series

Guernica.jpg
Picasso’s Guernica

This looks to be very exciting: Simon Schama’s The Power of Art series is beginning tonight on PBS TV in North America.

The power of the greatest art is the power to shake us into revelation and rip us from our default mode of seeing. After an encounter with that force, we don’t look at a face, a colour, a sky, a body, in quite the same way again. We get fitted with new sight: in-sight. Visions of beauty or a rush of intense pleasure are part of that process, but so too may be shock, pain, desire, pity, even revulsion. That kind of art seems to have rewired our senses. We apprehend the world differently.

Art that aims that high – whether by the hand of Caravaggio, Van Gogh or Picasso – was not made without trouble and strife. Of course there has been plenty of great art created in serenity, but the popular idea that some masterpieces were made under acute stress with the artist struggling for the integrity of the conception and its realisation is not a “romantic myth” at all. A glance at how some of the most transforming works got made by human hands is an encounter with “moments of commotion”.

It’s those hot spots in which great risks were taken that The Power of Art brings you. Instead of trying to reproduce the un-reproducible feeling you have when you are face to face with those works in the hush of the gallery or a church, the series (and the book) drops you instead into those difficult places and unforgiving dramas when the artists managed, against the odds, to astound.

– from the BBC site for Schama’s The Power of Art. It was shown in the UK last fall.

Artists featured in the series are Van Gogh, Picasso, Caravaggio, Bernini, Rembrandt, David, Turner and Rothko. More at this PBS page, and here are some short video previews.

Check your local schedules, please. I am really hoping that the Vancouver print TV schedule is correct that the first two parts will be aired at 9 and 10 pm tonight, coming from Seattle, as I’ve been getting conflicting information online. I’ll program the VCR in any case.

Thanks for the alerts from Art Biz Blog and Art for a Change.

UPDATE 9:00pm. Dang! It’s not on here. Looking at the PBS site again, I think it’s offered only on digital stations at this time. I’ll have to keep my eyes out for when and if it appears on plain cable. I’d love to hear from readers who do see this program.

June 18, 2007 in Being an Artist, Films, Other artists by Marja-Leena 10 Comments »

by Marja-Leena

The Danish Poet

title_window.jpg

Torill Kove, a Norwegian-Canadian animator with Canada’s NFB (National Film Board) won an Oscar this year for Best Animated Short Film. Her film, The Danish Poet, is a “charming 15-minute meditation on life’s peculiar coincidences, based loosely on a tale her father told her about how he met the woman who would become his wife and her mother. It is narrated by Liv Ullmann, the legendary Norwegian-born actress and director and Ingmar Bergman muse.” – from the Montreal Gazette.

Now I’ve just discovered that the film can be viewed in its entirety on the NFB website! You can also read more about this Canada-Norway Co-production, view an interview of Torill, short clips of the film and order a copy on its own website. I hope you enjoy this delightful animation as much as I did!

UPDATE Feb.28th, 7 p.m.: Some readers may be interested to know that Art Daily has short excerpts of the winners at the Academy Awards, including The Danish Poet.

UPDATE March 5th: It’s come to my attention that the full-length feature is no longer available on this site. It seems that it was up for the duration of the contest, which has ended. I think I struck it lucky finding it just before. Time to either buy it or rent it!

UPDATE Dec. 2013: It is available to subscribers or to buy the DVD.

UPDATE March 2014: Quite by accident I discovered it may be viewed for free at Open Culture.

February 27, 2007 in Culture, Films, Other artists by Marja-Leena 9 Comments »

by Marja-Leena

Goldsworthy: Rivers & Tides

rainshadowcropped.jpg

I’ve just finished viewing the DVD Andy Goldsworthy: Rivers and Tides. Wow! It is very beautiful, very inspiring and I want to view it over and over again. I’ve admired Andy Goldsworthy’s work in books, magazines and online but have never seen it in real life. This film captures that feeling of being there and seeing how the artist creates from materials in nature, often allowing the creations to be destroyed and returned to nature. Viewing the ephemeral seems to arouse a spiritual response in the artist as well as in this viewer.

I know this film has been out for several years, but by fluke I came across it in the library and hope to renew it and watch it a few more times, especially the extras. It is gorgeously filmed by Thomas Riedelsheimer with the support of YLE, the Finnish Broadcasting Company (surprise!) and other film production companies. I suggest a search on the web for images of his work if interested. The above one that I’ve captured is somewhat similar to one in the film, and which I really like because it reminds me of a petroglyph. If you haven’t seen Rivers and Tides, I highly recommend it!

November 6, 2006 in Films, Other artists by Marja-Leena 13 Comments »

by Marja-Leena

November

NovemberRain.jpg

November is here. You can tell by the weather, the heavy heavy rainfalls, the wind, the dark and gloomy days. Indoors never felt so good.

Turning inward means that my art work is continuing to develop in an interesting way, so I’m happy about that. But in other art related news, I’m disappointed with some news, as are many of my fellow printmakers who submitted work last spring for jurying to the Krakow Print Triennial. I found out second-hand from an artist who was was in Krakow for her solo exhibition there (she was the Grand Prix winner in 2003) that about 350 artists were selected from over 2500 applicants. Only three Canadians, unknown to us, were accepted and none from the US, a rather unusual result.

Rejection is par for the course but our biggest complaint is that there has been no communication from the triennial organizers about whose work has been accepted, which is unusual for an organization with an excellent reputation in the past. Funding issues, perhaps? Anyway, I had another look at the Triennial website and their list of winners, noting that one of the prize winners is a Canadian, one Cécile Boucher.

The dark, cool and damp evenings make us non-TV watchers a little more inclined to cuddle up on the sofa and watch a good movie. We’d been to the library a few days ago and scoured through their collection for some good selections so last night we watched one choice, The Constant Gardener. We enjoyed the love story, the exciting drama of attempts to expose the corrruption of the pharmaceutical companies in Africa, and most of all the film’s beautiful and horrible scenes of northern Kenya and its very colourful and musical people. Here’s a Quicktime trailer.

Now I’m awaiting the family’s arrival any minute for a visit and dinner, another pleasant diversion away from the miserable weather beyond the rain-washed windows.

November 4, 2006 in Being an Artist, Films, Other artists, Print Triennials by Marja-Leena 12 Comments »

by Marja-Leena

Shanghai in films

Shanghai11.jpg

From CBC TV: Some 20,000 white Russians fleeing the Soviet revolution flooded into Shanghai. Many [of the women] ended up in the entertainment industry and replaced the American prostitutes.

Last night, husband and I sat down to watch a movie on DVD that had come recommended and lent to us by our son-in-law. His good friend in the UK has a blind partner who had the interesting job of tutoring the lead actor of this film on how to behave as a blind person.

Another reason the movie interested us was that the story takes place in Shanghai in 1936 and 1937. In one of our very rare TV-watching evenings a week or two ago, we happened on a fascinating documentary Shanghai, Paradise for Adventurers, one of the CBC’s Legendary Sin Cities series. This is about life in Shanghai in the 20’s and 30’s, the so-called Paris of the East, a sometimes questionable refuge for many Eastern European Jews, Russians and other refugees as well as the numerous rich businessmen, playboys, adventurers and gangsters – before the coming chaos of war. A great historical background for viewing the movie.

The White Countess is a well-done story of a blind ex-diplomat (Ralph Fiennes) and a Russian countess and her family, played by the wonderful Redgrave women, against the turbulent political background of a Shanghai about to be attacked by the Japanese. Dramatic and compelling with lovely filming, as to be expected by the Ivory team, we enjoyed the human face and colour it gave to the history we’d just learned.

This film made me recall one of my favourite ones The Empire of the Sun. This story of a young British boy (played wonderfully by Christian Bale) began in Shanghai with another attack by the Japanese. I’m not fond of war movies, but this was an incredibly moving and memorable film for me. I’ve seen it twice.

Watching these films, it hit home again how much our history education was almost all western and northern, and how little we knew of Asia’s past. Now that China is a growing world power, our eyes look eastward and we want to understand its history, especially of the tumultous later 19th and the 20th century. So many parts of Asia came under the influence of white colonialists and businesses, Shanghai included. Since the CBC program, husband has been reading up on China, sharing interesting bits out loud with me, feeling the history that is now even more alive.

October 14, 2006 in Films, History by Marja-Leena | Tags:
4 Comments »

by Marja-Leena

Burtynsky in Vancouver

Burtynsky_Recycling%2320.jpg

Image on invitation: Edward Burtyntsky: Recycling No.20. Cankun Aluminum. Xaimen City, Fujian Province, China 2005. Chromagenic print, 58″ x 68″. Courtesy of Charles Cowles Gallery, NY.

I’m really looking forward to seeing the photographic works of acclaimed Canadian photographer Edward Burtyntsky right here in the Vancouver area. His exhibition ‘The China Series’ has been up for a while and runs until November 5th at Presentation House Gallery in North Vancouver. The artist will be in attendance at the reception Tuesday, October 10, 7 pm at the gallery.

Edward Burtyntsky will also be at the screening of the documentary ‘Manufactured Landscapes’ at the Vancouver International Film Festival.. Directed by Jennifer Baichwal, it follows the photographer as he travels the globe shooting landscapes transformed through commercial recycling, manufacturing and industry. That’s on Wednesday, October 11, 9:15 pm and on Thursday, October 12, 11:30 am at Empire Granville Theatre Cinemas #3.

Do read the exhibition statement at the Presentation House site and visit Edward Burtyntsky’s very informative website. Of course he’s been written about a great deal in the past few years, including in this blog. CBC recently wrote about the film, and so did Zeke.

P.S. I almost forgot, Gordon Coale wrote a review of the book Burtyntsky-China.

October 7, 2006 in Art Exhibitions, Films, Other artists, Photography by Marja-Leena 2 Comments »

by Marja-Leena

Finnish knitting lesson

TheLastKnit.jpg
(Still from The Last Knit by annekeAnna)

Talk about obsessive-compulsive, this animation is extremely well-done and hilarious.

Thanks to my husband for finding our evening’s laugh medicine. Enjoy!

September 25, 2006 in Films, Finland, Estonia & Finno-Ugric, Neat stuff by Marja-Leena 13 Comments »

by Marja-Leena

Jean Detheux

Sogna_MD_Still_6.jpg
Still from ‘Sogna Sakha 2005’ © 2006 Jean Detheux

Back in July, I wrote about Belgian-Canadian artist Jean Detheux, who creates wondrous works entirely digitally after giving up painting for health reasons. If you missed it, please go read it first and then come back here.

Through the magic of the internet, Jean Detheux chanced upon my article and sent me a nice email thanking me for my words. He also wrote that his work has evolved since that last interview of several years ago and that his new material (animation and interview) can be seen here. I enjoyed looking at his new animations set to music.

From the interview, I learned that Jean has produced some films for the National Film Board of Canada (NFB). This piqued my interest even more since I’ve written here about the NFB and Norman McLaren a couple of times. Jean gives a nod to McLaren by calling his DVD “Volatile materials”**, containing his two NFB films, as an “abstract animation after McLaren.” It is amazing to compare McLaren’s hand drawn films from the 1940’s to today’s digital animations, to see the march of technology.

Have a look at the NFB site – there’s a a short biography, and some stills from Liaisons and Rupture. I think these are beautiful glimpses of what must be gorgeous films.

I asked Jean if he’s still teaching as well. He wrote: “I was just asked to conduct a master-class at the NFB theatre (in Montréal) in celebration of the “International Animation Day” on the 28th of October. This will be made of three parts: a lecture/master-class, followed by the projection, in HD, of my 2 NFB films, “Laisons” and “Rupture,” followed by yet another “happening,” during which I hope to be able to improvise images/animation while 2 great musicians, Joane Hétu and Diane Labrosse will improvise their music.”

**Jean adds: ‘the “Volatile Materials” DVD contains also works by Chris Hinton and a few others, so it is not “mine” only even if it holds my 2 NFB films’.

September 14, 2006 in Films, Other artists by Marja-Leena 3 Comments »

← Previous Entries
Next Entries →