Le Blog de Zazie: Dead Ringers

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martedì 9 settembre 2014

Cronenberg at The Eye

I have fallen in love with The Eye few years ago, when I saw it for the first time.
I like everything, there: the building, the space, the cinemas, the bookshop, the bar, the exhibitions they make. So, every time I go back to Amsterdam, I can't help myself: I have to take the boat just outside the station and run towards my favorite museum in town.
If, on top of that, they decide to program an exhibition about one of my favorite film-makers (David Cronenberg) having a picture of Jeremy Irons on the poster, well, that's when The Eye easily becomes my favorite museum in the world!

Divided into sections corresponding to every single Cronenberg's production, the exhibition illustrates the incredible journey of this Toronto native movie-maker: from the first horror-gore-scientifics films of the '70s to the sharp and pitiless vision of this year Maps to the Stars, every movie is explained and illustrated. What I didn't expected, was the incredible amount of objects coming from the set of his movies. I was just crazy about it. It was like touching all those amazing and terrifying things that Cronenberg invented and created in the course of his career. For instance, wouldn't you be happy of being in front of The Fly's telepod??!

Even if the creature coming out of it, luckily enough, wasn't there to welcome us:

Believe it or not, the inspiration for the design of the telepod came from the cylinder's shape of Cronenerg's vintage Ducati motorcycle!!! The evidence:

And what about the nice writing machines from Naked Lunch?

Or the pistol made of bone and gristle from eXistenZ?

But don't worry, there were also less frightening things, like the mug from the diner of A History of Violence:

Or the suitcase for tattoos-makers from Eastern Promises... anybody for a tattoo made by Nikolai? (a bit scary, uhm?):

And, in case of a car accident, I'm sure you want to try one of those nice rib cages from Crash...

But of course, my most beloved objects were coming from Cronenerg's masterpiece, Dead Ringers, a 1988 movie about two gynecologists twin brothers, both (!) played by Jeremy Irons. If you are a woman, the side effect of this movie is that you don't go to see a gynecologist for at least three-four months after its vision, because you're simply too scared that your doctor could use the following instruments to "visit" you:

To my big surprise, in the exhibition there was also the reproduction of Jeremy Iron's bust (I don't remember exactly which was the purpose of it, but I'm very glad they had to do it).
Look at these perfect proportions!

Irons and Cronenberg worked together again in 1993, for a movie that I consider one of the most underestimated of cinema history: M Butterfly, which tells the (real) story of a British diplomate that fell in love in the China of the '60s with a a Chinese Opera singer (to find out only too late that the woman was, in fact, a man). One day I'll write a post about it. I simply adore that movie. In the exhibition there was a nice polaroid of Irons on set during a dress rehearsal:

Anyway, looking at this exhibition was absolutely clear that the constant theme of all Cronenerg's cinema is mutation, under all its forms. It was fascinating, scary and intriguing at the same time. I just felt like watching again and again all his movies (the museum programmed a complete retrospective during the time of the exhibition, that unfortunately will end next Sunday).
Last but not least, The Eye re-created the bar of the Naked Lunch, with a Mugwump seated at the counter waiting to drink and have a chat with people passing by.
A film-maker, for instance:

Or a cinema-blogger:

And in case you don't like this kind of bar and customers:

You can always opt for The Eye's lovely bar and restaurant:

You'd probably need a drink after a plunge in Cronenberg's world...

Un grazie di cuore a Linda, Gaetano e la mitica Moneypenny per la loro calorosa accoglienza!

venerdì 30 agosto 2013

The Zazie Alphabet

While on holiday, I was reading some cinema blogs when I stumbled upon a very nice idea, the one of a cinema alphabet.
The rules were quite simple:

Alphabet Rules:
1. Pick one film to represent each letter of the alphabet.
2. The letter "A" and the word "The" do not count as the beginning of a film's title, unless the film is simply titled A or The, and I don't know of any films with those titles.
3. Return of the Jedi belongs under "R," not "S" as in Star Wars Episode IV: Return of the Jedi. This rule applies to all films in the original Star Wars trilogy; all that followed start with "S." Similarly, Raiders of the Lost Ark belongs under "R," not "I" as in Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark. Conversely, all films in the Lord Of The Rings series belong under "L" and all films in the Chronicles of Narnia series belong under "C," as that's what those filmmakers called their films from the start. In other words, movies are stuck with the titles their owners gave them at the time of their theatrical release.
4. Films that start with a number are filed under the first letter of their number's word. 12 Monkeys would be filed under "T."

I immediately started to write down some titles, but it wasn't easy. For some letters, I had at least 4 or 5 movies I was thinking about. It was somehow frustrating, and so I stopped.
When I looked back to my list, after a few weeks, it was clear that I had to take a decision about all those titles. And I did. I just decided to follow the instinct of the moment, understanding that probably, another day, I would have picked up some other titles.
But in the end, it all made sense: many of my favourite film-makers and actors are there, there are at least three Truffaut's movies (surprise! surprise!), films are coming from different countries that I love and from different periods that inspire me, and each title reminds me of a story, of a particular moment of my life.
So, basically, if an unknown person should learn my own particular cinema language, this is the alphabet to understand the Zaziesque:

A
Les Amours Imaginaires
by Xavier Dolan (Canada, 2010)