Bergman yesterday and now Michelangelo Antonioni. What the hell is going on? If I believe in god, heaven and all those things I would say that God created a cinema studio in the sky and is hiring the best directors to do it. And off course they are European. Sigh. At least they had a good run. Aged 94, the director died The director died peacefully at home on Monday night, his wife, actress Enrica Fico, told La Repubblica newspaper.

My first Antonioni film was Blowup and I hated it. Wait, don't be made at me, I was ten. I watched again many years after and recognize his genius. But it isn't an easy film. I loved the way he played with the camera all over the film. I watched very few of his films after Blow Up and Story of a Love Affair is my favourite Antonioni, until now. Probably because I have a hidden passion for Italian neo-realistic films.

I know more about him and his films through books and films excerpts than for the films themselves. What shame! The best I can do in his homage is trying to find Red Desert to watch. For now, take a look at this collection of Antonioni's films posters and watch the L'avventura's trailer.

Posted by Bibi on July 31, 2007 04:02 PM in Cinema, People, People ||

Oh well, the inevitable happened, Ingmar Bergman lost the chess match. The Master has passed away this morning at his home in Fårö. My first Bergman film was Fanny and Alexander, but my passion for his works didn't start then. At nine years old, I didn't know much about cinema and I preferred comedies, than dramas. Thankfully my taste changed and in my second contact with his work with The Seventh Seal, the film caused a great impact on me.

Before starting watching his films I already knew something about them, I knew about his passion for silent films and that was the one thing that made grow my respect for him. But it were the films themselves that showed me a whole new wonderful universe of cinema language. Part of his genius mind can be discovered through a great book called Bergman on Bergman: Interviews With Ingmar Bergman. I read it years ago and I think it's time to do it again. But even being a huge fan of books about cinema, I know that to learn about something, you have to watch the films. That's what I'm planing to do: watch the Bergman's films I haven't watched yet.

It's sad to imagine that one more of my idols passed away. It's even sadder to imagine that a man has to die to have his work rediscovered. However, I'm waiting for a happy ending. Maybe the new generation will start to watch his films and see the beauty inside them. I do hope so.

P-E Fronning, from Martin Klasch blog, gave me the bad news today. He says that in Sweden today there were all kind of homages to him, and they were showing Wild Strawberries on TV. It sounds perfect to me. I will follow one of his suggestion and watch Smiles of a Summer Night.

For now, to know more about Bergman, visit his excellent official site, with videos, interviews, pictures, biographies, writings and interesting information, and read more about his work at BBC's article Why Bergman was an artistic giant. There are news about him everywhere, so you don't need to search too much to conclude how important his work was.

If you have the chance, watch a great documentary about the director made in 2004: Ingmar Bergman - 3 dokumentärer om film, teater, Fårö och livet av Marie Nyreröd (Bergman Island). It's talks about Bergman's personal life, cinema and theater, his greatest passion and something that is unknown to most of us.

Read also De Düva, Religious Affiliation of Film Directors, Swedish Cinema, Ingmar Bergman Face to Face, Medieval Macabre and Ingmar Bergman (in Portuguese).

Posted by Bibi on July 30, 2007 11:51 PM in Cinema, People, People ||

The comics writer Yvan Delporte (EN) passed away on March 5, 2007. He was the editor-in-chief of Le Journal de Spirou (Spirou), a Belgian magazine, between 1955 and 1968 during a period considered by many the golden age of Franco-Belgian comics.

He also produced an immense amount of stories for several artists during this period, like 'Saki' for René Hausman, 'Alain Cardan' for Gérald Forton, 'La Ribambelle' by Jean Roba and 'Starter' by Jidéhem. Most memorable was his collaboration with h Peyo, which gave the world the tribe of famous blue good-natured dwarfs, 'Les Schtroumpfs' ('The Smurfs'), and the introduction of 'Gaston', at first in the editorial sections and later in the gag strip by André Franquin. [...]

Along with André Franquin he was responsible for Le Trombone illustré in 1977, the legendary supplement of Spirou containing more adult comics. Notable series that appeared in this supplement were 'Idées noires' by Franquin, and 'Arnest Ringard' by Frédéric Jannin, with scripts by Franquin and Delporte.

More about Yvan Delporte and Spirou:

- Hommage à Yvan Delporte: a beautiful homage with illustrations, pictures and texts at the forum of Spirou site.

- InediSpirou: a site for fans, with 400 unpublished pages of Spirou comics.

- La mémoire du journal de Spirou: the series, authors, publications and some illustrations of Spirou at the BD Oubliées site.

- Le Monde article: Yvan Delporte, scénariste et ancien rédacteur en chef de "Spirou"

- Libération article: "Spirou", un magazine orphelin.

- The complet list of Yvan Delporte collaborations for Spirou magazine.

- The official site of Spirou - Le laboratoire Ultramoderne d'humour webdomadaire.

- Yvan Delporte short biography at the Lambiek.Net, and the French version.

Related posts: Comics in Deutschland and Bandes dessinées oubliées.

Posted by Bibi on March 7, 2007 04:21 PM in Comics, People, People ||

To celebrate Martin Luther King Day the blog of Internet Archive did a selection of videos and audio recordings with him. The FlickrBlog also made a homage, pointing to the photos in the Martin Luther King clusters.

Posted by Bibi on January 15, 2007 11:18 PM in Audio, Flickr, People, People, Politics, Politics, Video ||

Google made a very nice logo to celebrate the birthday of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle with thousands of links to you visit. I have some suggestions of links about him too, in this and this post. More cool stuff in public domain or free to download:

- Episodes available at Radio Nostalgia Network: The Final Adventure, 2 Episodes, A Scandal In Bohemia Intro, A Scandal In Bohemia Part 1, A Scandal In Bohemia Part 2, The Speckled Band Intro, The Speckled Band Part 1, The Speckled Band Part 2 and Sherlock Holmes.

- Films available at Internet Archive: Sherlock Holmes and the Secret Weapon and Dressed To Kill.

- Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's e-books available to download or read on-line at the Project Gutenberg.

- "The Ring of Thoth" - audiobook available at Internet Archive.

Posted by Bibi on May 23, 2006 01:03 AM in Audio, Cinema, Google, Literature, People, People ||

Here are marvellous news, if you appreciate the works of Ingmar Bergman. Ingmar Bergman Face to Face, the official Bergman's site now has an English version! Super! I had some hard times there using a translator, asking for help to a dictionary, but the material available made it worth it.

Ok, I'm going to tell you why it worth it. The film area shows a list with all his films, and every film has a page with cast and credits and plot summary. Some films have even more info in the pages: sources of inspiration, info about when the film was shot, epilogue, reviews and comments, awards, and media - with galleries of pictures, and video extracts of those films. Wild Strawberries is one of the great pages with more information and images.

That's only about his works in the cinema, but there are much more. Theatre and radio, his writings, timeline and my favourite Ingmar Bergman's universe. Now I'm going to do my happy dance for the great news. More Bergman at Cinematógrafo.

Posted by Bibi on May 22, 2006 07:26 PM in Cinema, People, People ||

Oh... that's morbid: Laurence Hutton Collection of Life and Death Masks - A Pictorial Guide by John Delaney. The masks are from famous people of course. Tolstoy is there, Walt Whitman too, and Shakespeare, Thomas Moore, Giacomo Leopardi, Oliver Cromwell, Elizabeth I, Queen of England, Napoleon, and Goethe! Ok, it's enough, too creepy for me. I'm going to bed now

Posted by Bibi on May 19, 2006 03:45 AM in History, People, People, Weird, Weird ||

Hey, do you remember of Thomas Dolby? The first phrase that goes to my mind when I remember of him is "She Blinded Me With Science". What a great hit! Totally 80's. Well, he not only has a site, as well as a blog. Listen to your curiosity and go there to check out his latest news.

Plus: more Thomas Dolby videos at You Tube - Hyperactive!, Europa And The Pirate TwinsVersion 1 and Version 2.and Synthesizer Medley performed in 1985 for the Grammys with Thomas Dolby, Herbie Hancock, Howard Jones and Stevie Wonder.

Posted by Bibi on April 19, 2006 09:26 AM in Blogs, Music, People, People ||

Le Tumulte Noir: Paul Colin's Jazz Age Portfolio.

In 1925, Josephine Baker (1906-1975) and the musicians and performers of her troupe, La Revue Nègre, exploded on the stage at Paris' Théâtre des Champs-Élysées with a wild new dance called the Charleston. The Jazz Age was at its height, and Baker was destined to become its high priestess.
Four years later, French poster artist Paul Colin (1892-1985), Baker's one-time lover and life-long friend, published a portfolio of vividly colored lithographs titled "Le Tumulte Noir" ("The Black Craze") which captured the exuberant jazz music and dance that dazzled Paris.

This year we celebrate her 100th anniversary. More about the fantastic Josephine at The Official Josephine Baker Website and Josephine Baker picture gallery. Note: some of her pictures are NSFW.

Upadate: Today I saw that PCL LinkDump posted about it too, few days ago. He also points to two links with works of Paul Colin (but the links aren't available now).

Posted by Bibi on March 12, 2006 07:44 AM in Art, Culture, People, People, Vintage ||

My apollogies to Kircher's fans. He made that stupid Kircher’s Cat Piano, however the German jesuit was also responsable for many great inventions and ideas as the Athanasius Kircher Project and Proceedings of the Athanasius Kircher Society sites show.

For those the love vintage images, the best introduction to Kircher's works is this neat coverpop flash page with a nice collection of his works provided by the Department of Special Collections of Stanford University Libraries. More about him at this, this, this, this and this post of Giornale Nuovo and this, this and this BibliOdyssey's post.

Posted by Bibi on March 7, 2006 04:25 PM in History, Illustration, People, People ||

Madonna Shots: The Rarest, The Barest and The Best pictures of Madonna. It's an impressive collection with hundreds of images, with photos from 1958 till 2004, including images of films, videos, cover of magazines, family photos, nudes and pictures used on the SEX book. I think I still her fan, because I lost 2 hours looking the photos. (via stationsvakt)

Posted by Bibi on August 22, 2005 06:04 PM in Music, People, People ||

One more Internet celebrity: Sister Furong on the Wired article No Sex, Please, We're Repressed.

Floozie or role model, attention monger or free spirit? For months, China has been debating what to make of its latest internet-born star, a young woman known nationwide as Furong Jiejie, aka Sister Furong. She is seen as a pioneer pushing the boundaries of traditional media controls but in the process has become a target of government censors in the tightly controlled country.

She isn't exactly a goddess but they say that she is daydreaming. More about her here that seems to be her blog, here (both in Chinese) and try this Technorati Tag.

Posted by Bibi on August 20, 2005 11:55 PM in Culture, People, People ||

André Bazin, An Unofficial Tribute To The World-Renowned Film Critic, Film Theorist and Cahiers du Cinema CoFounder. Read his works is "obligatory" if you like cinema. You can read some of his articles for the French magazine Cahiers du cinéma on its archives or start with the wonderful book What is Cinema? (Qu'est-ce que le cinéma?).

Posted by Bibi on August 11, 2005 03:48 PM in Cinema, People, People ||

Lili St. Cyr the queen of Burlesque.

Those who remember the exotic dances of Lili St. Cyr know that they were just that- while big busted raunchy girls were swaying hips and twirling tassels in the burlesque houses, Lili St. Cyr was pulling elements of fantasy, mysticism, ballet, and Eros into her act. Instead of taking it off, Lili was often putting it on, dressing on stage for her audience, and the results were no less tantalizing.

(via TackyTimes)

Posted by Bibi on August 10, 2005 12:26 PM in People, People ||

The Warhol: Time Capsule 21 - an interactive online exhibition work with audio, video and images.

Full of material dating from the 1950s to the early 1970s, TC21 is a treasure trove of ephemera, source material and artwork. The content of the box offers a lens onto diverse aspects of Warhol's art and life and the socio-cultural context of his times.

(via torredepapel)

Posted by Bibi on July 5, 2005 03:17 AM in Art, Culture, People, People ||

Paul Laurence Dunbar Digital Collection with images of book covers, a complete biography, his poetries, photos, images and text of libretti and more trivia.

Paul Laurence Dunbar, born in Dayton, Ohio, on June 27, 1872, was the first African-American poet and novelist to attain international recognition. Dunbar was known for his use of dialect, but was also an accomplished poet and novelist in standard English. At age seventeen he published his own newspaper, the Dayton Tattler, an African-American newspaper printed by his high school classmate and friend, Orville Wright. His first book of poems, Oak and Ivy, was published in 1893. The book contained Dunbar's first dialect poem, "A Banjo Song." Dunbar published numerous books of poetry, novels and music during his career. He died in Dayton on February 6, 1906.

Visit also the Paul Laurence Dunbar Homepage, Paul Laurence Dunbar Scrapbook and Paul Laurence Dunbar Collection- a great photographic collection with a lot of material about him.

Posted by Bibi on June 22, 2005 10:23 PM in Books, Literature, People, People ||

I was searching for some information about Billy Wilder and I have to confess that I'm a bit disappointed. Or Google is totally crazy or the true is that there isn't a fabulous site about him, as I hoped so. Even the Wikipedia article about him is shame, or the problem is the cinema session there? Anyway, I found some nice links about him and his films, but this stupendous screenwriter and director deserves a wonderful page.

- Billy Wilder biography on German-Hollywood Connection site, with the complete list of films, books and many links.

- Billy Wilder: a Reel Classics with information about his films, images of posters, audio (MP3), video of short scenes (.AVI and .MOV), awards and links.

- Billy Wilder: nice article of Senses of Cinema about him. The site has also more four articles about his films here, here, here and here.

- Billy Wilder: About Film Noir - an interview focused on his noir films Double Indemnity, Sunset Boulevard and Ace in the Hole with a few but beautiful photos of these films.

- Film Noir Directors: Billy Wilder - short biography and two pages of his films Double Indemnity and Sunset Boulevard with pictures, summary and review.

- Posters and pictures (62 images) of his films (many Audrey Hepburn's photos from Sabrina) listed by Rotten Tomatoes.

- Sunset Boulevard - The online tribute to Billy Wilder's classic tale of the Golden Era of Hollywood.

Posted by Bibi on June 21, 2005 07:47 PM in Cinema, People, People, Posters ||