Ataraxia

  Stranger Than Paradise written by Jim Jarmusch and John Lurie, directed by the former is one of The New York Times’ Best 1,000 Movies Ever Made – not that it matters, but there are a few thousand notes on films from The NYT 1,000 and other lists on my blog https://realinibarzoi.blogspot.com/2025/09/do-you-have-any-feedback.html   8 out of 10   A rather unusual proposition, the name Stranger Then Paradise could serve as a warning – strange is the name of the game – although on the other hand, we could also say that this looks like a rather banal narrative: this lady lands from Hungary, stays with her cousin for a while, then leaves, he comes after her and they travel to Florida   ‘Fiction is infinitely preferable to real life. As long as you avoid the books of Kafka or Beckett, the everlasting plot of fiction has fewer futile experiences than the careless plot of reality. Fiction's people are fuller, deeper, cleverer, more moving than those in real lif...

  Rififi aka Du rififi chez les hommes by Auguste Le Breton was The 1955 Winner of The Best Director Award for Jules Dassin, and The Nominee for The Palme d'Or at that same Cannes Film Festival, it is also one of The New York Times’ Best 1,000 Movies Ever Made – you find plenty of notes on films from The NYT 1,000 list on my blog, here is the link https://realinibarzoi.blogspot.com/2025/09/do-you-have-any-feedback.html   8 out of 10   There are many motion pictures, books, sometimes the former are inspired by the latter, dealing with crime, robberies, for instance Asphalt Jungle https://realinibarzoi.blogspot.com/2025/07/the-asphalt-jungle-by-wr-burnett-10-out.html and Rififi is one of The New York Times’ Best 1,000 Movies Ever Made for good reason   Tony le Stéphanois is a criminal, some of his pals suggest an easy shtick at the then famous jewelry Mappin and Webb- Jo le Suedois and Mario Ferrati propose that they take a car, go to the window of the ...

  How Did All This Happen?: A hilarious and moving memoir, from the comedian that inspired Bradley Cooper’s new movie Is This Thing On? by John Bishop, in some ways, I liked this more than Marty Supreme https://realinibarzoi.blogspot.com/2025/09/do-you-have-any-feedback.html Frankenstein, and maybe Bugonia   8 out of 10   Blue Moon https://realinibarzoi.blogspot.com/2025/12/blue-moon-written-by-lorenz-hart-robert.html was the best motion picture of 2025 for this cinephile, who would give it The Oscar for Best Film and then more: Best Actor in a Leading Role would go to Ethan Hawke, Supporting for Bobby Cannavale, and for Margaret Qualley another trophy   Is This Thing On was not as exhilarating, but as stated, it is better than Frankenstein, or Marty Supreme in my book, which just goes to prove you should not be reading this, these are just biased lines, written on the principle "De gustibus non disputandum est", and yes, I get that these are both imp...

  Red River written by Borden Chase and Charles Schnee, directed by Howard Hawks is one of The New York Times’ Best 1,000 Movies Ever Made https://realinibarzoi.blogspot.com/2025/09/do-you-have-any-feedback.html I try and look at what Red River means now, with MAGA embracing ‘values’ that belong to previous centuries, as in XIX, maybe XIII?     9 out of 10   Red River used to be celebrated as one of the greatest motion pictures, indeed, it still appears on The New York Times’ Best 1,000 Movies Ever Made list, but then the narrative might have been awkward for one generation, and now it can gain momentum again, what with MAGA screaming for blood, violence, get the aliens out…   Those who lead America now have a vision of history that may be reflected in Red River, for one thing, Native Americans – I think they were Cherokee at some point – were ‘bad, violent’, and America belongs to ‘Americans’, which means WASP, white Anglo-Saxon protestant, or...

  The Burning Court by John Dickson Carr was strongly recommended by my favorite writer, Kingsley Amis: ‘I will offer a small prize to any such person who can read the first chapter of Carr's The Burning Court and not in honesty have to go on’ – however, it is only ranked 4114 th on The Greatest Books of All Time, while The Hollow Man is 441 st – JD Carr has three books on The Top 100 Mystery Novels of All Time, Three Coffins, The Devil in Velvet and The Hollow Man – you find a few thousand reviews of magnum opera on my blog https://realinibarzoi.blogspot.com/2025/09/do-you-have-any-feedback.html and YouTube channel       8 out of 10   I have been thrilled by The Hollow Man https://realinibarzoi.blogspot.com/2025/08/the-hollow-man-10-out-of-10.html by John Dickson Carr, called ‘the best locked room mystery of all time’, just as The Burning Court ‘is hailed as Carr's best non-series novel’, and an impressive achievement in my own opinion, though...

Making Movies by Sydney Lumet If you want to learn about the movie business, you can’t do better than this- 10 out of 10   In this fabulous book, one of the best directors of all time tells you the way movies are made-well used to be made anyway. From working with actors to editing, from the sets arrangements to the money issues, moving to focus groups- we learn a lot about what goes on behind the scenes and how some of the best movies have been made. It is wonderful to listen to the author of The Network talk about the making of it, the performances and the associated issues. I had no idea that placing Sean Connery- who is very tall- and Dustin Hoffman- on the short side- in the same frame is difficult. There are focus groups that tell you what to make with the movie and this is definitely upsetting Sydney Lumet. People are invited to watch a movie and about twenty of them will give opinions which may alter the whole picture. One executive even asked the great director if he could...