Showing posts with label great. Show all posts
Showing posts with label great. Show all posts

Sunday, December 30, 2012

Film Festival 3

Demi Moore in G.I.Jane .. Permission to dress .. Sir.

Intro

The nice things about the days around X-mess and New-Year. You can get a drink and watch some good, bad, ugly, sad, silly and crazy movies. Only staight stories, not very intellectual. A mix of shit and shoehine. My third mini film-festival.

City Heat

Clint Eastwood and Burt Reynolds are a love-hate detective team. Saving a girl in distress. A kind of prequel to Dirty Harry. The dialogs are amazingly funny.

G.I. Jane

Demi Moore is invited to become the first female Navy Seal. First she is lured into a political scheme. Then she takes her fate into her own hands. The director knows what an 'arc' is - when she shaves her head, she gets nasty.

Air Force One

Harrison Ford (president) and Glenn Close (vice-president) are struggling to stay in control of the USA. Ford (a Vietnam veteran) single handed kicks out Gary Oldman from Air Force One. Gary is always casted as the bad guy. He is my top-3 with Lee Van Cleef and (forgot his name). A real cliffhanger. "Get Of My Plane" deserves a famous movie quote.

Taking of Pelham 123

John Travolta (bad guy) and Denzel Washington (good guy) in a psychothriller. A New York underground is kidnapped. Killing a hostage every minute. I never used the FF knob.

Who should I pick

I guess you have seen some of my favorites. This is just a caleidoscope.

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Thursday, December 27, 2012

Apple

Christina Applegate.

Oh My God. I just clickwed a link. Got hit between the eyes. I blogged her before. Repeating myself. Impact. Some tears over-here. How I loved this series.

The story is about Elvis. One of the crasiest episodes. I am (a kind of) Elvis fan. Here is some footage from Tupelo.

I love Christina Applegate. She had both her tits removed. Breast-cancer. So a strong and an impressive gal and still so sexy. The story behind the scenes does it all.

I'm actually a bum-guy. But tits, boobs, breasts (whatever) are a woman's treasure and a boy's wet dream. I do kind of imagine. It's like false teeth. There is a big step to do. Removing your tits. Getting out of your comfort zone. After that you are lucky and happy again. Sorry, uncle harry is talking with his teeth out.

Talking about tits. Sure, it's sexy. But actually they are a basic instrument for growing new generations. This clip gave me some other thoughts. Hundreds of tits flapping up and down. Is it sexy? I don't know. Big and small, flat and pompous. Teens and twins. Dance and joy. Imagine. Afro. Female. Proud. Racist. Whatever.



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Wednesday, December 26, 2012

Story

Don't get fooled by Tony, Chino, Riff or Bernardo. The movie is about Anita and Naria.

The other day I saw the West Side Story again. On widescreen in the EYE museum. Restored and digitized. The loud music was an extra spice to this event. Two-and-a-half hours of a top quality multi-media. A real treat. A must see.

The movie got 10 Oscars in 1962. The dances and the music are so great. Street-rap and immigrant topics. Still relevant in nowadays Holland and in the US of A. Did I mention Leonard Bernstein? Probably a legel immigrant. He is one of my favorites. He tried to explain Mahler to 12 yo. kids. No chance. So cute. There is nothing to explain. Lots to listen. LB made did the music for this movie. Classic, Jazz, Latin, a huge mix of great tunes.

The WSS is about the Jets and the Sharks. I guess you know the story. Testosterone driven street-gangs in New York. Even today a very hot topic. The WSS was [1] a musical on Broadway. Later [2] they made the movie. It's actually about the women. Don't get fooled by the men. This was sharp thinking. 10 Oscars. It's not about Riff and Bernardo. Even Tony and Chico are side-kicks. It's all about Anita and Maria. Girls have hormones too.

Anita (Rita Moreno, in purple dress, Puerto Rican, Shark-side) and Maria (Natalie Wood, in white dress, American, Jet-side) are the real heroins of this movie. In the end, they have a bond. Girls are in, boys are out. Riff, Bernardo, Tony and Chino all leave the movie prematurely and the girls survive.



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Sunday, December 23, 2012

Film Festival 2

Poster of the original Django movie.

Ciao. Here is my second little film-festival. It's about Spaghetti Westerns. It's a huge genre that started in the early 60's and going on for more than two decades. It probably had some roots in the 50's with the Zorro and the Zapata characters. With the links and some deep googling you can get a masters-degree in Spaghetti Westerns.

Here I focus on Quentin Tarantino's Django Unchained. The relaese was postponed for the Newport "incident". That was a respectful gesture. I'm not going into that, simply because I have no words for this tragedy. In January the movie will be in the cinema's. The press already had a preview and the reviews are good.

The Django character (Franco Nero) was basically created, produced and directed by Sergio Corbucci in 1966.


Clint Eastwood, Sergio Leone and Ennio Morricone are probably the best known names for their Dollar Trilogy.

"I think [the Leone films] changed the style, the approach to Westerns [in Hollywood]. They made the violence and the shooting aspect a little more larger than life, and they had great music and new types of scores. They were stories that hadn't been used in other Westerns. They just had a look and a style that was a little different at the time: I don't think any of them was a classic story, like [John Wayne's 1956] The Searchers or something like that. (Clint Eastwood, reflecting on the impact of the Dollar Trilogy).


- Eli Wallach was the Good
- Clint Eastwood was the Bad
- Lee Van Cleef was the Ugly
Oh man, how I love Lee Van Cleef.

But there is more. Much more. There were more than 500 spaghetti westerns made. In this little film-festival we want to show you some roots and backgrounds of Spaghetti Westerns. Without further ado, here are some moving pictures;

  • The Spaghetti West is a docu about the genre.
  • Here is a long interview with Clint Eastwood.
  • Here is the original 1966 Django movie.
There are some prequels and sequels. Quality is mixed. But in a film festival you can expect several movies;

Enjoy.



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Tuesday, December 18, 2012

Film Festival

I'm sure this 1958 movie is cult. The trailer of the original is hilarious.

I found three remakes;
- The 1993 remake is a feminist B-movie.
- The 1995 remake is an R-rated slap-stick.
- The 2012 remake is a mild sexy comedy.
Well, here you have my first mini film festival. Enjoy.

When I look back to the 1000+ posts on my blog, it's about movies, all kinds of music, modern and classic ballet, photography, and some sexy stuff. All the things that make me enjoy life. Mainly old-school. Later on maybe architecture, literature, poems, paintings, performances will kick in. And writing blogs is an intellectual joy.

I'm still deep into moving pictures. It's a frantic collector's kink. I now have almost 5000 movies on my hard-disks. Mainly art-house. I've seen a lot of them but not all. Discovering new insights every time I watch a movie.

Downloading movies is legal in the Netherlands. Uploading copyrighted material is not. But on Youtube you can find lots of full movies and in the future I could upload some more. That looks pretty safe. When they get a complaint, they remove the movie.

I fantasied about organizing a small film-festval. I was triggered by the Stanley Kubrick exhibition in the EYE film-museum earlier this year here in Amsterdam. It showed many props from his movies. Very exiting. You could see (but not touch) the cardboard bomb from Dr.Strangelove. That gave me the shivers.

Me organizing a film-festival is probably a bridge too far. There are lots of people involved. Not realistic. So, I will make my own little festivals here on this blog.

You must know that I like serious interviews, the-making-of and behind-the-scene footage. It makes you much more appreciate a movie, an actor or a director. A movie is a multiyear and multimillion project. Actors do months of research and physical preparation. You grow a deep respect for these people. A few examples;

  • Jodie Foster in Taxidriver grew her pinky-nail to sniff coke. She researched that with real life prostitutes. A little detail but it gives you an impression how actors prepare themselves.
  • The shooting of Raging Bull was suspended for a few months because Robert de Niro had to gain weight for the later parts of the movies.
  • Hilary Swank trained every day for three months in the gym to gain some ten pounds of muscle-mass for her role in A Million Dollar Baby. Impressive efforts.
  • Sofia Copolla at age 7 (daughter of Francis Ford) walked around on the sets of Apocalypse Now with a camera. It gave a unique behind-the-scenes documentary of this mega-project.

Be prepared. You can expect everything from cult to classic, from gore to great, from romcoms to sitcoms, from candy to cannibals, from sleaze to splatter, from WIP to war, from silly to serious, from early sci-fi to new Japanese sleaze and even lesbian movies from Vietnam.

I still must find some coherent themes to publish my 'mini-film festivals'. On average I like old 'lost-and-found' movies that are hard to come by. They are my little secrets that I will share with other movie freaks. I'm sure you can find all the recent block-busters - but that is not my cup of tea.

I don't know where to start. There's so much great footage around. It's hard to stay focused. I start with 'the other side of' Bruce Willis. Here is a 35 min. interview in 2001 for The Actors Studio Drama School. That's a masters for actors, writers and directors. You will hear some more of it in future blogs. What you can notice in this interview is, that Bruce Willis is actually a very shy person - a sharp contrast with his hard-boiled characters he played. Revealing interview. In The Sixth Sense Bruce is a stranded child-psychologist who engages in a last challenge. It's a convincing and sensitive performance and a very entertaining movie.

I blogged this 'manual' before. Quentin Tarantino (from California) and Robert Rodriguez (from Texas) will give you some more tips about B-movies and double-bills. They talk an hour long about their Grind-house, Death-Proof and Planet-Terror project. It gives you so much insight in rural and big-city American movie culture. I loved it.

Back to the manual. Before you decide to download the 'Faster Pussycat' movie you should check;

The inviting poster, the exciting trailer and the boring movie are made by completely different people. There can be a huge mismatch. Be warned. But I guarantee you, this movie is a great cult hit. A few years ago there were rumors that Quentin Tarantino planned a remake of 'Pussycat' with Britney Spears. Well, these type of projects take some years. Let's wait and see.

Sometimes a trailer can be a piece of art on its own. But now I'm repeating myself. I mentioned this in earlier blogs. Some extreme 'New Japanese' examples that I like very much. Warning. Not for the weak-of-heart. It's over-the-top violence with chopped limbs and splitted heads and fountains of blood. Take care.

That's all for today. A nice few links to chew on. I hope it gives you some impression what you can expect. My next film-festival will be about Godzilla, Hamlet, Betty Boop or Winona Rider. Surprise, surprise. Stay tuned.



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Monday, December 10, 2012

Sally

Shining copper.

Moonshine, my lovely moonshine. A hobby that I started 20 years ago. Never finished. I still have about 80% of all the copper kettle parts in my cellar. About time to rejuvenate this hobby. All missing parts can now easily be purchased from the internet. Mind you, I studied three books. I call myself a home made expert (theoretically, kind of).

I was triggered by this Hillbilly movie. You just have to see the first few minutes to see what I mean.

Home made alcohol from the Apelaches has many names;

  • Moonshine
  • White Lightning
  • Brown Mule
  • Painters Piss
  • Who Shot Sally
I think I call my brew Sally's Piss.

I already have a copper kettle of 80 liters. It's from an old boiler. All tubes and piping is there. Just solder them together. I still need a thermometer to distinguish between ethyl- and methyl alcohol. At first you get some poisonous methyl alcohol from the distilling process. It boils a few degrees sooner than the ethylalcohol that we want.

First you ferment corn, sugar, water, tasty fruits and yeast in a few jerrycans. It will have around 10% alcohol. You then fill the 80 litre kettle with max. 60 liters and slowly boil the brew. The alcohol vapors will cool down in the piping and it will drip in your jar. Theoretically you can get 6 liters of alcohol. That's 18 liters of Sally's, about 25 bottles.

Then you can repeat the distilling process. From the first pass you'll get about 70~80% of alcohol with a lot of tasty stuff from the fermented brew. In the second pass it will be over 90% with less tasty stuff. In Dutch we call that 'dubbel gestookt'.

Then you must put spices, herbs and fruits in the 90% alcohol and let it stay for a few days or so. There are many recepies. To make it drinkable you then have to dilute the alcohol with water, fruit juice or a mix of both. Maybe even some of Sally's Piss.

I'm not going to quote all the books that I've read, I'm just blogging this to re-dig myself into a hobby that I left 20 years ago. First I will finish my moped, then I will pick up Sally. There are still some to-do's in this project.

  • make a kettle-column connection
  • tin the inside of the column
  • solder all piping together
  • mount a thermometer on top
  • make a heating stand under the kettle

Stay tuned, happy new-year and God bless you.



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Saturday, December 8, 2012

Salade

Salade Nicoise is peanuts compared to my salad.

De feestdagen zijn altijd vette pret. Met oudjaar ga ik koken voor mijn zus en zwager. Daar zit ik al weken op te broeden. Net besloten - niet koken - het wordt mijn super maaltijdsalade. Er komen die avond ook nog oliebollen en andere hapjes op tafel, dus we houden het licht. Het overdoen van een X-gangen kerstmaaltijd lijkt me niet zo'n goed idee.

Ik serveer mijn super-salade met een koele rozé of witte wijn en knapperend stokbrood. Ik heb alvast een doosje wijn laten afleveren. Het stokbrood gaat mijn zus regelen.

Toevallig schoot dit recept mij weer te binnen. Het originele recept ging uit van “drie” maar dit is dus een dubbele portie. Ik heb mijn 10 liter emmer nodig om alles erin te krijgen. Dat is niet zo raar als het klinkt. Mijn vader maakte het deeg voor zijn handgemaakte kerstbrood in een wastijl. En mijn moeder was handig met de oven. Lekker dik boter erop. Dat was nog eens smullen. Groene sucade, geraspte citroenschil, krenten, rozijnen, laten weken in échte rum. Met water, meel en gist kom je een heel eind voor het deeg. Dat lag dan een paar uur te rijzen onder een theedoek. Een leuke familietraditie.

Ik denk nog wel eens aan mijn vader. Hij was bakker van beroep en als zodanig in Duitsland tewerkgesteld. Daar ontmoette hij mijn moeder. In Duitsland weten ze heel goed hoe je Kerst moet vieren. Dat was toch best wel een winnende combinatie. Elk jaar feest. Appeltaart en appelflappen waren ook altijd home-made. Goudrijnetten en een appelboor. Kom daar nu nog maar eens om. Een kilo Euroshopper meel kost 30 cent. Dat heette voeger 'bloem'. Gist kun je wel bij een warme bakker krijgen. Recepten kun je op het internet vinden. Misschien moet je die familietraditie voortzetten. Maar dan moet je wel snel zijn, want we zitten al in de Advent.

Sorry, ik dwaal weer af. Terug naar mijn maaltijd-salade. Het basisidee is simpel. De gekookte aardappelen, eieren en spek is het 'maaltijd' gedeelte, de rest is het 'salade' deel.

Shit, nu je het zegt, dit recept is een soort "Euro-fusion". Aardappelen, eieren, spek en uien in de koekenpan opbakken is een stevige duitse maaltijd. Je kunt hier ook denken aan een engels ontbijt (ham, spam, bacon and eggs). De rest is mediterrane frivoliteit met een hollands accent.

Met drie stappen heb je een heerlijk pot eten.

  • zoveel mogelijk ingrediënten door elkaar lepelen
  • een smeuïge saus uit de blender er doorheen roeren
  • en een dagje laten staan
Ik ben een fan van De Blender. Ik word gillend gek van een 100 delige keukenmachine. Een blender is heel goed bruikbaar voor vloeibaar spul en ook handig in mijn afwastijltje. Je kunt er ijsblokjes ingooien en rare drankjes en vruchten mee mixen. Experimenteren met een blender is heel leuk.

Uit mijn mouw geschud. Maar dit zijn wel de verplichte eerste ingrediënten:

  • 1 hele komkommer in dobbelsteentjes
  • 4~6 vleestomaten in dobbelsteentjes
  • 1~2 grote gesnipperde uien

Net als olijven en fetah-kaas kun je dit allemaal in de supermarkt vinden. Leuker en beter is natuurlijk om de Albert Cuijp markt of de Dappermarkt af te lopen.

Lekker flinke hapklare brokken. Dus niet te klein. Ongeveer zo groot als een flinke olijf of een amsterdams uitje.

  • 4~6 augurken
  • 2~4 eetlepels zilveruitjes
  • 2~4 eetlepels amsterdamse uitjes
  • 1~2 ons fetah-kaas (geitenkaas)
  • 2~3 eetlepels pitloze zwarte olijven
  • 2~3 eetlepels pitloze groene olijven
  • een halve rookworst van de HEMA in dunne plakjes (GRAPJE)
Voor zuur moet je bij dat joodse winkeltje zijn in Amsterdam-Zuid, vlak bij de RAI. Voor olijven en fetah moet je naar de markt. Ik kan me nog steeds druk maken over de deense fetah. Gemaakt van koeienmelk. Smaakt naar niks. Waardeloos. Harry is boos. Fetah is geen beschermde naam, dus iedereen kan je knollen voor citroenen verkopen. Vraag naar de originele fetah, gemaakt van geitenmelk. Zo helpen we onze griekse vrienden weer een beetje.

Laat je fantasie de vrije loop en verzin nog wat meer ingrediënten.

  • 2 blikjes ansjovis in olie in stukjes
  • 1 ons zacht uitgebakken spekreepjes
  • 1 klein blikje Bonduelle doperwtjes
  • 1 klein blikje Bonduelle maiskorrels
  • 1 klein blikje Bonduelle ananas partjes
De ansjovis is bijna een verplicht ingrediënt. Het mogen ook 1 of 3 blikjes zijn. In halve partjes gesneden. Sommige mensen houden niet van vis.
Je kunt de spekjes hard en knapperig uitbakken of zacht en sappig. Het is maar waar je van houdt.
De blikjes groenten en fruit zijn een extra frivoliteit. Leuk voor de kleur en de smaak. Niet overdrijven. Voor deze spullen moet je toch écht bij de supermarkt zijn. Maar dat is geen schande.

Liever vroeger dan later. Je moet eerst wat ingrediënten koken (ja, toch wel een beetje koken) zodat je die bij de hand hebt tijdens de bereiding.

  • 8 minuten koken . 6~8 flinke eieren – daarna in partjes snijden
  • 6 minuten koken . 6~8 flinke aardappelen – eerst in dobbelsteenjes snijden (basis)
  • 4 minuten koken . 12~16 sperciebonen – eerst in stukjes snijden
Alles kun je in één pan koken. Flink water. Eerst de eieren erin en aan de kook brengen, na 2 minuten de aardappelbrokjes erbij en daarna de sperciebonen. Let goed op je horloge, want timing is hier belangrijk. Hier willen we de aardappelen en sperciebonen bijt-gaar hebben. Na het koken de hele pan in het vergiet kieperen. Je kunt het spul nog even laten nagaren in de pan of direct onder de koude kraan zetten. Even laten drogen, want we willen niet teveel water in het recept.

En toen kwam de saus. Die maak je in de blender. Eén dobbelsteentje van alle ingrediënten zorgen voor een 'smaak-harmonie' met de salade. (dat verzin ik nu ook maar).
De mosterd-honing-knoflook smaak is wel dominant. Het rauwe ei en de olijfolie zorgen voor een mayonaise-achtige stuctuur. Je giet dan (veel) olijfolie erbij in de blender, totdat er een dunne yoghurt ontstaat. Pas op, dit mengesl kan meer dan 0,5 liter worden en dus de capaciteit van je blender teboven gaan. De saus kun je door de salade lepelen (heerlijk schranzen) of er apart bij serveren (dat heeft wat meer stijl).

  • 3~4 eetlepels mosterd
  • 2~3 eetlepels honing
  • 3~4 teentjes knoflook
  • 1~2 stukjes van alle ingrediënten (géén aardappel)
  • 1~2 rauwe eieren
  • flink olijfolie erbij en door de blender malen

De verhouding mosterd-honing is standaard 2:1 maar dat kun je natuurlijk zelf aanpasssen.
De smaak van mosterd gaat half verloren in de blender. Als je de milde Zaanse mosterd gebruikt, proef je bijna niks meer. Ik adviseer de pittige Dyon mosterd.

Nee, dit is geen grap. Ik heb dit recept al in vele varianten gemaakt (zonder rookworst). De hoeveelheden en verhoudingen zijn maar een beetje belangrijk. Je kunt zelf de smaak- en kleuraccenten verleggen van 'maaltijd' naar 'salade' of er een eigen draai aan geven.

Succes.



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Wednesday, November 21, 2012

Poems

Denkend aan Holland, zie ik rivieren door oneindig laagland stromen. Actually, these are German WW-II soldiers, trying to cross a Dutch River.

Intro

Eecept for this silly Percy Shelly stuff, here are some Dutch poems.

Cees

The 'Blauw-Bil-Gorgel' still is a famous poem in Dutch literature. If I had to translate that, it would be 'Blue-Butt-Gorgeous'. It's an experimental format from Cees Buddingh. He was once declared as the most boring Dutch poet by our 'elite' witers. Especially by hot-tempered Willem Frederik Hermans. Cees is super-cool. He's a favorite of mine. Just like Simon Carmiggelt and Godfried Bomans. Cees was from the city of Dordrecht. The last place where you want to live in the Netherlands.

There is a Goeman-Borgesius-Plantsoen in Dordrecht. How do I know that. Because I had a friend on my primary school. I forgot his name. We were both bullied. We had a connection. He relocated to Dordrecht. I got his adress. I never saw him again.

Johnny

Johnny van Doorn (aka Johnny the Selfkicker) was a poet-performer in the late 1960's. His 'Sun' poem is still underestimated.

Marsman

Thinking of Holland. Wonderful poem. Put on music by this undergraduate.


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Tuesday, November 20, 2012

Strad

In this blog, a Strad is as much a legend as a Fender Stratocaster. You can search my blog for 'Fender' or 'Zappa' to read the Jimi Hendrix stratocaster story.

Girls, girls, gils. Musical girls. No Rihanna, Madonna, Gaga or Beyoncé. My girls are of the classical type. No misunderstanding; every poppy girl went through thousands of hours of practice ands devotion. Respect for every body.

Why does a Stradimarius or a Giardini violin sound so great? They tried to replicate it many times. Nobody ever succeeded. It was not the lacker. The story goes, that around the 1700's there was a mini ice-age. Trees grew slower then. Especially on the north side of the Italian Alps. That's where the wood came from. I like this lovely 'broodje aap' story.

I'm not sure if it was French philosopher Pierre Bourdieu who stated that reality is all imagination and imagination is all reality. A deep thought, but not very practical.

How do you get this bunch of sexy women into one blog? Well, years and years of practicing. I blogged them all before. Enjoy these lucious lady's.

You must have noticed by now my classic kink. Here's a Beethoven clip from Valentina Lisitsa Beethovens's Moonlight Serenade.


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