a private affair

brigitte bardot in vie privee, 1962.

guy bourdin

nailin' it

easy rider, 1969

vertigo, 1958

harold and maude, 1971 

blowup, 1966

cool hand luke, 1967

some movie posters just nail it...and these ones certainly do. i think there is something that just really works about red, yellow, and orange hues with basic black and white... it's a no-nonsense, straight-forward look that kind of flashes right at you. i like that. i think all of these posters would look great together, in different frames, hanging on the same wall...or at least in the same room. 

in the mood for love

this poignant, beautiful scene is from wong kar-wei's film 'in the mood for love'. a story of a married man and a married woman living right next door to one another, who eventually discover that their spouses are having an affair. they begin a cautious friendship, leaning on another for support, but their own relationship becomes taut with desire, tension and deep yearning. the film is stunning and sensuous, quivering and ardent, yet it is also restrained— full of slow deliberate pauses...as if the camera were holding its' breath, but still gaping, still watching. i'm awed by the music and the movement of this scene, what the camera follows, the shapes and light, the small but perfect details that so explicitly begin to express what is between these two characters— a quiet but breathless need for one another, so subdued and inhibited on the surface, but relentless and bellowing beneath...and the aching space between them, unseen and indefinite, but a real distance that can't be closed, a separateness that endures despite their desire and proximity. 

i love lucy...

so basically i'm pretty obsessed with 'i love lucy'. i mean, how good is lucille ball? she's amazing. her and ethel are so absurd and hilarious. they are always sneaking around and goofing things up. they are perfectly wonky. and it's so great how they are supposed to be these pulled together prim housewives but they just can't be that, they have to be out-of-control jokesters...they can't get away from themselves...even though lucy is always making promises to her husband to not get into trouble, there is just no way that is gonna happen. i love these kinds of characters- the bumbler, the trickster, the oddball, the buffoon. they get me every time. this particular clip from 'i love lucy' makes my stomach hurt from cracking up so hard. imagine having a mom like lucy. or a sister or a best friend. how awesome would that be?

a parenthetical moment

dance scenes in film are often some of my favorite moments. if, of course, they are done well... if they capture some flighty trembling truth...some heartbreaking flash of humanity. this scene from jean-luc godard's 1964 film 'band of outsiders' does it well. really really well.