Interiors

Woody Allen's Ingemar Bergman film. Meet a bunch of people having White People Problems (This vase doesn't fit in my bedroom! The critics don't understand me!). It's hard to decide which of the characters is most selfcentered, the prize possibly going to the writer, played by Richard Jordan. Are they all annoying to make loud, vulgar Pearl, Maureen Stapleton, the most appealing character in the film? It looks great, though, in muted grey and beige tones, with cinematographer Gordon Willis apparently taking some inspiration from Whistler's paintings. And Woody Allen luckily realized, after this, that you can make a serious film but still put in some jokes.

Illustration...

for French magazine Spirou.

And happy birthday, Raymond Chandler!

July 23, 1888 – March 26, 1959

Happy birthday, Ernest Hemingway!

Ex Libris

...done for Parisian comic book store Super Heros.

Mazzy Star

New song by Mazzy Star: http://www.spin.com/articles/mazzy-star-california-stream-seasons-of-your-day/

Top 5 Mazzy Star songs:

1. Five String Serenade
2. Into Dust
3. Fade Into You
4. I've Been Let Down
5. Flowers In December

Cat and Lost Cat 2

from Fantagraphics' tumblr blog

Another nice review...

of Lost Cat, at Newsarama, here:

http://www.newsarama.com/18326-best-shots-extra-young-avengers-suicide-squad-batman-more.html

The truth and the lie

I was watching Margot at The Wedding, by Noah Baumbach, and it was exactly how I had been afraid The Squid and The Whale would be like (but wasn't): Unlikable people yelling and screaming, captured by handheld cameras in unlit rooms, and the film shows the truth of how people act and behave, but why would I want to watch this? At the same time I was reading / looking at the pictures in the third Flash Gordon collection by Titan Books, where Flash Gordon and Dale Arden dont quarrel, don't fuck or get drunk, or even scratch their noses; it's an idealized love affair that has nothing to do with reality. And I know those two things can't really be compared, but I woke up this morning thinking that if I had to choose between the two, between the truth and the lie in things I watch or read, in most cases I'd choose the lie.

Rabbit sketch

Lost Cat, Out Now!

At least in the US. There's a pretty good review of the book at Comics Alliance, here:
http://comicsalliance.com/jason-lost-cat-review-fantagraphics/

Hands in pockets 2

Drawing...

done for Benjamen Walker's podcast Benjamen Walker's Theory of Everything:
http://toe.prx.org/

Bruce Minney

Ivan Bilibin 2

The Dead

I was just watching season 1 of Hell On Wheels, and then put on this film and there's Colm "Betcha U2 are shitting themselves" Meaney, 25 years younger. It's a timeless, beautiful film, John Huston's last, and reminding me a bit of Ingemar Bergman's Fanny and Alexander.

The story takes place in Dublin, 1902. Zombies are roaming the streets. A group of friends gather for a last christmas dinner, trying to ward off the darkness. The zombies finally break through the doors, and help themselves to the dinner guests' brains. Anjelica Huston manages to escape with her husband. They hole up in an empty hotel and she tells him the tragic story of her first love. Then the husband turns into a zombie and eats her brain, as the snow is falling faintly through the universe, upon all the living and the dead.

Lost Review

Publisher"s Weekly about Lost Cat:

A humorous PI story populated by animals takes a turn toward the absurd in the newest—and longest yet—graphic novel by Jason (Athos in America). Dan, a dog detective who evokes Humphrey Bogart’s down-on-their-luck antiheroes, is consumed by a chance connection brought about when he discovers a lost cat. Dan’s normal assignments are anything but feel-good; he spies on cheating spouses with the end result that no one is happy. When he finds a cat for Charlotte, a charming bookstore owner, he connects with her instantly, and when she disappears, he continues the conversation they might have had. An introduction of aliens to the plot adds a light and strange flavor, but echoes the protagonist’s feeling of loneliness in a strange world. Jason’s artwork is charming, and he evokes a surprising amount of pathos with a cartoon dog. The plot, an enjoyable crime noir lark that gives homage to The Big Sleep, is almost incidental to the surprisingly deep story about the relationships people create in their heads.

http://publishersweekly.com/978-1-60699-642-3

Gumshoe

A nice little Maltese Falcon pastiche, with snappy, chandleresque dialogues and Albert Finney doing his best Humphrey Bogart. It's Stephen Frears' first film. The story takes place in Liverpool. Do British directors deliberately try to make British cities look depressing? Or are British cities simply depressing? There's the same gray weather and brick buildings as in Get Carter. And then, on Downton Abbey, the sun is always shining. So the weather in Britain, it's a class thing?

Bluebeard's Eight Wife

Gary Cooper meets Claudette Colbert, Gary Cooper loses Claudette Colbert, Gary Cooper gets Claudette Colbert back. Also starring David Niven, directed by Ernst Lubitsch.

Now this is more like it! A better screwball comedy, in my mind, than The Palm Beach Story. A witty script co-written by Billy Wilder, with Cooper in his prime rather than the old guy in Love In The Afternoon, Colbert is very appealing, they're great together and there's even Edward Everett Horton doing the Edward Everett Horton thing.

The Last Wave

Richard Chamberlain is a lawyer defending five Aboriginals in court. He has strange dreams. Meanwhile the weather goes bananas. Directed by Peter Weir.

I saw this film on tv as a kid back in the 70s, but the only thing I remembered was the Are you a fish? scene. It should be a double feature with On The Beach, another End of the World in Australia film; there's a definitive millennium / 2012 feel to it, making it more relevant, not less, than when it was made. It's a slow film, possibly even a bit pretentious, but sometimes you miss that in movies, before reaching that haunting final image.