Sister Sue is still here, the last of the lingering Thanksgiving visitors. We saw Marie Antoinette the other night, and completely loved it. The film creates a vision of adolescence confined by excess and formality. If you could imagine. What else to do but buy shoes, eat fabulous pastry, and stage little performances in your Petite Trianon? It’s Sofia Coppola’s Picnic at Hanging Rock–the same kind of tension and sensual immersion, but with butter!
Face of Another, Teshigahara’s masterpiece (with screenplay by Kôbô Abe, from his novel!) played last night at the Castro. I didn’t see it, but was so excited by the possibility of seeing it again, I had to tell you. It’s one of my favortie movies about identity. Another favorite Japanese film dealing with identity from that era is Death By Hanging, by Oshima, about a man sentenced to death by hanging. He survives, and his executioners, as well as a doctor, a lawyer, a priest, and the dead woman herself, decide what to do next…
I’ve maxed out my dvd shelves. It had to happen. Actually, it has happened several times, but now the floor below and space above the shelves are full. It’s all ready to topple on top of me in the event of the slightest tremor. I’m in the process of replacing the thicker covers with the thin 5mm deals–except for my beloved Criterions, OOP’s, and box sets–filing away the printed covers, and making my own printed covers with titles in Standard Coco Futura Condensed. Do other people do this kind of thing? Am I scaring you away?