February 1940: Pinocchio

Pinocchio. Norman Ferguson. 1940.

I’ve never seen this one, but I’ve seen excerpts from it every Xmas (on a couple of channels), so I’ve heard the intro song more than a 80 times, and I’m feeling very Xmas-y now.

You can say many things about Disney, but at least they took really good care of all the stuff created under their auspices. So this Bluray looks really good, and in its original aspect ratio.

I find the animation somewhat confusing, though. That is, I thought that Disney was better at this stuff? Like, the fox villain character just… doesn’t look all that good.

Film critic Leonard Maltin said, “with Pinocchio, Disney reached not only the height of his powers, but the apex of what many critics consider to be the realm of the animated cartoon.”

See? It’s not that good.

It was a box office disaster upon release, which doesn’t surprise me. The character animation just doesn’t seem to be as accomplished as the 30s Disney shorts. But the background stuff and the effects are very nice.

The story is also… Well, it makes absolutely no sense, so I guess they justified it as “a parable”. It gets rather tedious. But the first half (before the plot, as it is, gets going) our is kinda nice.

Popular movies in February 1940 according to IMDB:

PosterVotesRatingMovie
sc-tt0032325.jpg9847.7Charlie Chan in Panama
sc-tt0032910.jpg957397.5Pinocchio
sc-tt0032413.jpg11467.5Dr. Ehrlich’s Magic Bullet
sc-tt0032284.jpg16077.4Broadway Melody of 1940
sc-tt0032610.jpg6067.2The House of the Seven Gables
sc-tt0032828.jpg20817.0My Little Chickadee
sc-tt0033289.jpg8267.0Young Tom Edison
sc-tt0032263.jpg2447.0Blondie on a Budget
sc-tt0033221.jpg5736.8Vigil in the Night
sc-tt0032315.jpg3916.8Castle on the Hudson

This blog post is part of the Decade series.

January 1940: His Girl Friday

His Girl Friday. Howard Hawks. 1940.

And we’re off!

I’ve seen this movie plenty of times before, and that’s not what I want to do in this blog series, really, but I had bought a new copy of this (as part of a screwball box set), so what the hey.

And, as you all know, it’s a wonderful film. The snappy repartee between Cary Grant and Rosalind Russell really er snaps, and it’s got an interesting milieu (a newspaper office) and built-in tension (they have to save an innocent (well, he’d only killed a “colored” policeman, which is the next best thing) man from being executed).

It’s a romantic screwball comedy, but perhaps some of Grant’s strategies towards getting Russell back veer into creepy coercion at oints, but what the hey. It’s a clockwork plot. Everything slots together neatly.

“He sounds like a man I ought to marry,” Grant says at one point, and I’m sure the entire set chortled. And describes what Bruce Baldwin looks like as “that guy from the movies… Ralph Bellamy”. Which is the actor playing him.

It’s all so meta!

It’s a strangely shot film, with most of it happening in a couple of rooms with people running in and out of them. It’s not very visual.

Which is a staple of screwball comedy, but was this based on a play, by any chance? Hm… It was!

It’s a thrill.

Popular movies in January 1940 according to IMDB:

PosterVotesRatingMovie
sc-tt0033045.jpg209528.1The Shop Around the Corner
sc-tt0032551.jpg665518.1The Grapes of Wrath
sc-tt0032599.jpg426498.0His Girl Friday
sc-tt0032981.jpg31657.7Remember the Night
sc-tt0032125.jpg2397.4Where’s That Fire?
sc-tt0032181.jpg13657.4Abe Lincoln in Illinois
sc-tt0032339.jpg26327.4A Chump at Oxford
sc-tt0031976.jpg6837.2The Stars Look Down
sc-tt0031394.jpg3607.1The Green Hornet
sc-tt0032467.jpg14156.8The Fighting 69th

This blog post is part of the Decade series.

Decade

When watching movies, it’s easy to get stuck in a rut and always return to your favourite genre. (Which, for me, is science fiction. I’ll basically watch anything that’s science fiction, no matter how bad it is, and it gets really, really bad.)

I’ve tried to mix it up by giving myself various stupid challenges, like watching a film from each country on the planet, or watching all the films of a director or an actor in a ridiculously in-depth way.

So I was wondering what to do next, and the idea occurred to me a few years back to do a deep dive into some specific era. And a decade is a nice slice of time. But which one?

I first thought about the 70s, because there’s a lot of interesting stuff from that decade I just haven’t seen, but there’s also so much… 70s… stuff… that it seemed a bit off-putting.

Then the 30s. I was all gung ho for watching smart alecks talking rapidly in the general direction of the other person, you see!, but while doing a 1968-1922 thing, I was a bit unimpressed by the very early 30s films. Things really took off, like, in 1933 or something. (NB! Probably wrong opinion.)

And I’ve seen so many 50s and 60s films, which leaves us…

The 40s.

Even though that means watching a whole bunch of war films. And besides:

Douglas Sirk, in an interview included on the Criterion edition of There’s Always Tomorrow, is quoted as having said that the 40s were a golden age for American films.

(It also, fascinatingly enough, has a note on the correct aspect ratio using the remarkable sentence: “The above images are a distortion and corruption of the original artwork, which travesty the integrity of both the human form and cinematographic space.” Not only is travesty a verb, but it’s a transitive verb! Wonderful! I learn so much.)

ANYWAY!

My methodology for choosing films this time is based on the old IMDB data dumps, which included release date data.  (IMDB has removed this information from their current exports.  Boo!)

I sorted the films per month, and then sorted the films on rating and number of votes per month.  Then I chose the highest-rated film per month (that I hadn’t seen before), unless a lower-rated film sounded more interesting.  (And this is also subject to availability; quite a few popular 40s films just aren’t available at this point in time.)

But nothing obscure; these are mostly all 120 commercial successes and not art house films.

Onwards!

New Music

Music I’ve bought this month.

After starting to sort the music I have by release date, I noticed that I have like absolutely no music from the 60s.  So I’ve been trying to explore that slightly more (like with the absolutely wonderful Bobbie Gentry), but I’m not really sure what methodology to use.

I mean, I had a look at “best albums from 1967” and stuff, and the music there is like the worst.

jukebox.php?image=micro.png&group=Various&album=%23savefabric+(4)jukebox.php?image=micro.png&group=Figurine&album=2+Song+7%22+Recordsjukebox.php?image=micro.png&group=Bert+Jansch&album=A+Man+I'd+Rather+Be+(3)%3A+Jack+Orionjukebox.php?image=micro.png&group=John+T.+Gast&album=Angelajukebox.php?image=micro.png&group=The+Sea+and+Cake&album=Any+Day
jukebox.php?image=micro.png&group=Flower+Travellin'+Band&album=Anywherejukebox.php?image=micro.png&group=Robert+Lippok&album=Applied+Autonomyjukebox.php?image=micro.png&group=Nine+Inch+Nails&album=Bad+Witchjukebox.php?image=micro.png&group=Claudia+Brucken+%26+Jerome+Froese&album=Beginnjukebox.php?image=micro.png&group=The+Westbrook+Blake&album=Bright+as+Fire
jukebox.php?image=micro.png&group=A+Certain+Ratio&album=Change+The+Stationjukebox.php?image=micro.png&group=%C2%B5-Ziq&album=D+Funk+EPjukebox.php?image=micro.png&group=Laura+Jean&album=Devotionjukebox.php?image=micro.png&group=Figurine&album=Discard+EPjukebox.php?image=micro.png&group=Virginia+Wing&album=Ecstatic+Arrow
jukebox.php?image=micro.png&group=Tangerine+Dream&album=Encore+Livejukebox.php?image=micro.png&group=Yoko+Ono&album=Fly+(2)jukebox.php?image=micro.png&group=Oren+Ambarchi&album=Grapes+from+the+Estatejukebox.php?image=micro.png&group=The+Necks&album=Hanging+Gardensjukebox.php?image=micro.png&group=Other+People's+Children&album=Happy+Friend+in+Frosted+City
jukebox.php?image=micro.png&group=Circlesquare&album=Hey+You+Guys+2010+Remixjukebox.php?image=micro.png&group=Archie+SHepp%2C+Karin+Krog&album=Hi-Flyjukebox.php?image=micro.png&group=RP+Boo&album=I'll+Tell+You+What!jukebox.php?image=micro.png&group=Let's+Eat+Grandma&album=I'm+All+Earsjukebox.php?image=micro.png&group=Figurine&album=Impossible
jukebox.php?image=micro.png&group=Karin+Krog&album=Joyjukebox.php?image=micro.png&group=Gang+Gang+Dance&album=Kazuashitajukebox.php?image=micro.png&group=Other+People's+Children&album=Library+Records%3A+Shhh6jukebox.php?image=micro.png&group=Jeremy+Shaw&album=Liminalsjukebox.php?image=micro.png&group=Adult.&album=Limited+Edition
jukebox.php?image=micro.png&group=Tuxedomoon&album=Live+at+Deaf+Club+(1979)jukebox.php?image=micro.png&group=Blaine+L.+Reininger+%26+Steven+Brown&album=Live+in+Tokyo+(1985)jukebox.php?image=micro.png&group=Bobbie+Gentry&album=Local+Gentryjukebox.php?image=micro.png&group=Miss+Kittin+%26+The+Hacker&album=Lost+Tracks+vol.+1jukebox.php?image=micro.png&group=Lost+Trax&album=Lost%C2%B2
jukebox.php?image=micro.png&group=A+Certain+Ratio&album=Mind+Made+Upjukebox.php?image=micro.png&group=Synaesthesiae&album=Music+of+the+Spheresjukebox.php?image=micro.png&group=Shakatak&album=Night+Birdsjukebox.php?image=micro.png&group=Bobbie+Gentry&album=Ode+to+Billie+Joejukebox.php?image=micro.png&group=Other+People's+Children&album=On+a+Clear+Day
jukebox.php?image=micro.png&group=Yob&album=Our+Raw+Heartjukebox.php?image=micro.png&group=The+Police&album=Outlandos+d'Amourjukebox.php?image=micro.png&group=Malaria&album=Revisitedjukebox.php?image=micro.png&group=Various&album=Rogue+Pulse%3A+Gravity+Collapse+(5)jukebox.php?image=micro.png&group=Neil+Young&album=Roxy+-+Tonight's+the+Night+Live
jukebox.php?image=micro.png&group=Various&album=Satan+In+Lovejukebox.php?image=micro.png&group=Simon+%26+Garfunkel&album=Sounds+of+Silencejukebox.php?image=micro.png&group=James+%26+David+Figurine&album=Splitjukebox.php?image=micro.png&group=Tigue&album=Strange+Paradisejukebox.php?image=micro.png&group=Nicola+L.+Hein+%26+Mia+Zabelka&album=The+Honey+Pump
jukebox.php?image=micro.png&group=Various&album=The+Shildam+Hall+Tapesjukebox.php?image=micro.png&group=John+Butcher%2C+Andy+Moor%2C+Thomas+Lehn&album=Therminaljukebox.php?image=micro.png&group=Kaja+Draksler+%26+Susana+Santos+Silva&album=This+Lovejukebox.php?image=micro.png&group=Excepter&album=Thronejukebox.php?image=micro.png&group=Anne+James+Chaton+%26+Andy+Moorr&album=Tout+ce+que+je+sais
jukebox.php?image=micro.png&group=Trio+Blurb&album=Wjukebox.php?image=micro.png&group=Simon+%26+Garfunkel&album=Wednesday+Morning%2C+3AMjukebox.php?image=micro.png&group=David+Bowie&album=Welcome+to+the+Blackout+(Live+London+'78)+(1)jukebox.php?image=micro.png&group=David+Bowie&album=Welcome+to+the+Blackout+(Live+London+'78)+(2)jukebox.php?image=micro.png&group=Lotte+Anker&album=What+River+Is+This
jukebox.php?image=micro.png&group=Beverley&album=Where+The+Good+Times+Arejukebox.php?image=micro.png&group=The+B-52's&album=Wild+Planet

Nails and Hammers

You know that old saying about gravitating to your favourite tool? Well, my go-to thing for compositing text on top of images (and stuff) was LaTeX, and I’ve been doing that for decades.

What I’m mostly using this stuff for these days is the extremely important task of displaying weather data on small, cheap USB-powered monitors that I have here and there around the apt.

For instance, in the hall I have something that plays a random-but-related youtube clip (with no audio, of course) of whatever’s playing on the stereo, and on top of that I have a LaTeX-generated overlay that says what temperature it is and the rain forecast over the next 24 hours (that’s the line; rain ahoy).

It’s composed by this Perl script that uses LaTeX to generate the clock and the temperature text, curl to download the weather data, gnuplot to make the nice line, ghostscript to make a .pnm file, and som pbmplus things to composite it all.

And what occurred to me the other night is that I wanted to have a tiny text at the bottom there that told me the name of what was playing to and I thought “that’s just so much work”, and then I started wondering whether I should just rewrite all this in Emacs Lisp and use my new favourite hammer: svg.el.

Presto! Still rainy!

It’s now a pure-Emacs image compositing thing which I’ve put on Microsoft Github if you want to read it, but it’s not generally useful. But you could perhaps use a couple of the elements if you want to do something similar.  I also finally got a reason to play with xelb/xcb, which I’ve always wondered about.  Seems like a very nice library, and maps 1:1 the X concepts onto Emacs Lisp.

Compositing images via svg.el is fun!

One thing that I thing I’m going to expand upon and put into Emacs is the SVG path/bezier curve stuff, because I think that would be generally useful.

This bug report adds a new function, svg-path, but I think Eli’s objections are right. Instead of adding such a low-level function, instead we should have, like (svg-multi-line svg points :type ‘bezier :smooth 0.2) that would compute the boring Bezier stuff for you. SVG supports insanely complicated paths, but I don’t think that’s all that useful in general…

But I don’t have time to do implement that properly now, but perhaps sometime this winter…

Oh, and while implementing this, I miscomputed the font size for one of the displays (that just displays what’s playing), and I thought it was such a striking mistake that I kept it.