Happy Valentine's (2 of 4): Love in the Arts........

These are scenes from two Shakespeare plays ("Romeo and Juliet" and "Othello") as well as a Turkish and an Italian film, a drawing of a French version of "Bonnie and Clyde" and a Japanese anime still.

Happy Halloween and Happy Anniversary To Us

Happy Halloween to everyone around the world........even in remote parts of Indonesia.........

Today, also marks the 7th anniversary of this blog, and part of the reason why it is called "The Daily Vampire" is because we launched the blog on Oct. 31st, 2008.

Our first image was of Christopher Lee who sadly died earlier this year.

Today's image is of the late Turkish actor Atif Kaptan who played Dracula in "Drakula Istanbul'da" in 1953.

Our other personal favorite vampire actor is Bela Lugosi.

Thanks for checking whenever you can, and we look forward to providing new entries whenever we can, even though there are some pessimists who strongly feel that blogging is dead (no pun intended)!

Top Ten Sunday Comics from Gocomics.com: Making Fun of Donald Trump and Darth Vader

Greetings to our friends in Boulder, Colorado, and their sister city of Dushanbe, Tajikistan....

Tonight, we bring you our favorite Sunday comics from gocomics.com, a syndication which features many big titles, including "Garfield," "Dilbert," "Pearls Before Swine," "Get Fuzzy" and "Marmaduke," yeah, that is probably not their most cutting edge comic strip.

This week, "Doonesbury" once again lampooned the ridiculousness of  the Donald Trump presidential candidacy by calling the Donald "Mister Clown." Though I've never met Garry Trudeau, I wonder if he also thinks Paris Hilton or Kim Kardashian (w are not sure where they stand politically) would have also qualified for tomorrow night's Republican debate from Cleveland, Ohio.

Two of the comic strips in our survey, "Brewster Rockit" and "La Cucaracha" made fun of Darth Vader. In "Brewster," Darth laments his intergalactic battlefield losses while in the Hispanic-character strip, Vader zips by in a cool car as if he is Danica Patrick.

"F-Minus" featured a creative recycling gag while "Flying McCoys" depicted pigeons flying with Superman to take advantage of mass transit, which is why we have an image of the late Turkish actor Tayfun Demir (center) who played the Man of Steel in a yesteryear rip-off of the D.C. Comics franchise.

Meanwhile our "Heart of the City," our top pick of the week featured a satire of the famous "Psycho" shower scene, this one featured a child instead of Norman Bates.

Here is our top ten:

*-strips in the Washington Post


1. Heart of the City

2. F-Minus

*3. Doonesbury

4. Flying McCoys

5. La Cucaracha

*6. Lio

*7. Brewster Rockit: Space Guy"

* 8.WuMo

9. Close to Home

10. Ziggy

http://www.gocomics.com

http://www.washingtonpost.com

http://www.doonesbury.com

The Last Ten Movies We've Seen (as of Wednesday)........Are We the Doom Generation?

Greetings to our blog readers in South Korea, Romania, and Egypt......

Happy Ramadan to our Muslims friends.....

Today, we look at the last ten films we've seen; this is an idea we originally got from "Film Comment" magazine, where Gavin Smith is the editor-in-chief.

The last ten films we've seen, include two that are in theatres ("Me, Earl, and the Dying Girl;" "The Overnight"). The earliest Hollywood film on the list is "The Brothers Karamazov" (bottom image) which is a 1958 film which marked the film debut of William Shatner (Captain Kirk on "Star Trek") and the earliest film overall is "Torment" from 1944, a Swedish film with a screeenplay from a young Ingmar Bergman.

The other two foreign-language films on the list are "Inside" (Yeralti) by Turkish director Zeki Demirkbuz and "Stray Dogs" (center image) from Taiwanese filmmaker Ming-ling Tsai.

It is not very often that we have a film from the 1990s, or the "Seinfeld" decade as we like to call it, on the list, but the very last film we saw on this survey is a strange spree killers road movie called "The Doom Generation" (top image: Courtney Love, we are using her symbolically as she is not in the film) which features a supporting character played by Parker Posey, who is one of the film's few highlights! (We agree with the late Roger Ebert who called it an awful film!).....

Here is the last ten:

1. "The Doom Generation." director: Gregg Araki. 1995.

2. Stray Dogs. Taiwan. dir: Ming-ling Tsai. 2013

3. The Dark Crystal. Jim Henson and Frank Oz. 1982.

4. Next Stop, Grenwich Village. Paul Mazursky. 1976.

5. Death Hunt. Peter R. Hunt. 1981 w/ Charles Bronson and Lee Marvin

6. The Brothers Karamazov. Richard Brooks. 1958.

7. The Overnight. Patrick Brice. 2015 w/Jason Schwatzman

8. Torment. Sweden. Alf Sjoberg. 1944

9. Me, Earl and the Dying Girl. Alfonso Gomez-Rejan. 2015

10. Inside. Turkey. Zeki Demirkubuz. 2012

http://www.filmcomment.com

http://www.tcm.com

Last Ten Films I've Seen: Lots and Lots of Imports

Greetings as always to blog readers around the world, including those of you in Australia, Canada, and Germany.

This is our first entry since the catastrophic, seismic, Armageddon nightmare, mid-term elections, which saw the Republican gain more houses in the U.S. Congress and completely take over the U.S. Senate, but fortunately Sen. Mark Warner (D-Va) did prevail over Ed Gillespie.

Even though we differ with his politics and his policies, we want to congratulate Cong. Bob Goodlatte (R-Va) who has represented Virginia's sixth district since 1993, and now, thanks to perfect gerrymandering, he probably will be representing the Sixth district until the year 2045 (correction: he turns 103 in 2055), when he will be circa 103 years old. Thus, we are using the image of Goodlatte (center) for the film "Dear White People" which is on this list. We are also looking for photos of Goodlatte in a bathing suit, but alas there are none to be found on Google.

Of the ten films we last watched, eight are from foreign countries, including Kazakhstan, Romania, Israel, the Netherlands, Japan, Turkey, Iran and Norway.

Finally, so none of you are confused, the bottom image is of the Oklahoma Sooners bandwagon used when the team plays home football game; "August: Osage County," a film based on a play takes place in Oklahoma. It stars Meryl Streep and Julia Roberts.

Here is the list:

1. "Tuesday after Christmas." Romania. 2010. dir: Radu Muntean.

2. "Uszipin." Israel. 2004. dir: Giddi Dar

3. "Headhunters" Norway. dir: Mortem Tyldum

4. "Ichi the Killer" Japan. 2001. dir: Takashi Miike.

5. "Waiting Room" Turkey. 2004. dir: Zeki Demirkubuz.

6. "Dear White People" 2014. dir: Justin Simien.

7. "Schizo." Kazakhstan. 2004. dir: Gushat Omarova

8. "August: Osage County" 2014. dir: John Wells

9. "Leila" Iran. 1997. dir: Dariush Mehrjui

10. "Abel" (or "Voyeur"). Netherlands. 1986. dir: Alex van Warmerdam

The Last Ten Films I've Seen (as of Oct. 2nd): Some Depressing Dramas

Greetings to our blog readers in Libya, Dubai and India, where we assume the top image might cause us problems.

Amazingly enough, seven of the ten films on this list were seen via Netflix dvds or Netflix streaming, while one film "My Old Lady" was actually seen in a movie theater.

"Prime Cut" is a vintage early '70s action-drama with the late, great Lee Marvin, Gene Hackman, and Sissy Spacek in her film debut, some four years before she became Carrie White in "Carrie."

"For the Bible Tells Me So" illustrates the rift between conservative evangelical Christians who believe in literal interpretations of the Bible, in terms of viewing homosexuality as a sin, as well as gays and lesbians, and their liberal supporters, who strongly find this views reprehensible.

"My Old Lady" is a humorous English-language film set in France, in which Kevin Kline discovers that the home his father left him in Paris is occupied by Maggie Smith and her grown-up daughter played by Kristen Scott Thomas.

Here are the last ten films we've seen:

1. Prime Cut. 1972. Director: Michael Ritchie

2. Free Samples 2012. Dir: Jay Gammill w/Jesee Eisenberg

3. Fruitvale Station. 2013. Dir: Ryan Coogler. w/ Michael B. Jordan

4. For the Bible Tells Me So. (documentary). Dir: Daniel G. Karslake

5. Mandabi. Senegal. 1968. Dir: Ousmane Sembene.

6. Xala. Senegal. 1975. Dir: Ousmane Sembene.

7. My Old Lady. 2014. Dir: Israel Horovitz.

8. Take My Eyes. Spain. 2003. Dir: Iciar Bollain

9. Paradise: Hope. Austria. 2013. Dir: Ulrich Seidl

10. Block-C. Turkey. 1994. Dir: Zeki Demirkubuz

 http://www.netflix.com

Last Ten Movies I've Seen: In the Age of Netflix Streaming

Greetings to our blog readers in the Czech Republic, Azerbaijan and Canada.

Yes, there is a legit reason why we have images of Mao Tse Tung, a fried egg and Charlie Brown; they are all somehow related to the last ten films I've seen, which includes four films watched via Netflix streaming and another three watched through Netflix dvds! But, we did actually see "Boyhood" and "Snowpiercer" at the cinema.


Here is the last 10:

1) Not Fade Away. dir: David Chase. 2012

2) Yumurta/ "The Egg." Turkey. dir: Semih Kaplanoglu. 2007.

3) That Cold Day in the Park. dir: Robert Altman. 1969.

4) "La Chinoise"/"The Chinese" France. dir: Jean-Luc Godard. 1967.

5) Buried. Dir: Rodrigo Cortes. 2010 w/ Ryan Reynolds

6) Ginger and Rosa. Dir: Sally Potter. 2012.

7) Snowpiercer. South Korea (in English). Joon-ho Bong. 2013

8) A Touch of Sin. China. dir: Jia Zhangke. 2013

9) Stuck in Love.dir: Josh Boone. 2012.

10) Boyhood. dir: Richard Linklater. 2014

The Next Ten Films We Hope 2 Watch: We Just Love Goldie Hawn and Charlton Heston Flicks

1) "The Story of Louis Pasteur" (1936. dir-William Dieterle) 7.4 (IMDB rating)

2) "Enter Laughing" (1967. dir-Carl Reiner) (see top image) 6.5

3) *"Breathless" (France. 1960. dir-Jean-Luc Godard) 8.0

4)* "L'Enfant" (Belgium. 2005. dir-Jean-Pierr and Luc Dardenne) 7.4

5) "No" (Chile. 2012. dir-Pablo Larrain.) 7.5

6)* "Climates" (center image)  (Turkey. 2006. dir-Nuri Bilge Ceylan) 7.3

7) "West of Memphis" (doc. dir-Amy Berg) 7.9

8) "Butterflies Are Free" (bottom image) w/Goldie Hawn (1972. dir-Milton Katselus) 7.2

9) * "Soylent Green" w/Charlton Heston (1973. dir-Richard Fleischer) 7.1

10) * "My Dinner with Andre" (1981. dir-Louis Malle) 7.7

*-Films we've previously watched

http://www.imdb.com

Birthplaces of Star Trek People: The Original Cast, et al

At the last moment, we came up with this crazy idea, well, ok this plan was suggested by Javier the Intern*_ and, it is to name the birth places of various people who are in some small way connected to "Star Trek." Yes, of course, Javier thought of this because there is yet another Star Trek film, what is this 45 so far?

Here we go:

1) William Shatner. Captain Kirk (pictured above): Montreal, Canada

2) Joan Collins (pictured above): London, England; she was a guest star in the episode "City on the Edge of Forever," considered to be the best episode on the original show.

3) Mari Dusay: Hays, Kansas, USA; she was a guest star on "Spock's Brain," which is widely considered to be the worst episode on the original show.

4) Sadri Alisik#: Istanbul, Turkey, he played Tourist Omer in "The Turkish Star Trek" (1973)

5) George Takei: Los Angeles, Calif., USA; he is the original Mr. Sulu.

6) Leonard Nimoy: Boston, Mass., USA: Mr. Spock, we presume.

7) Patrick Stewart: Mirfield (Yorkshire), England

8) Malcolm McDowell- Horsforth (Yorkshire), England

9) Ricardo Montalban#: Mexico City, Mexico

10) John Belushi#: Chicago, Ill., USA

11) Jim Carrey: Newmarket (Ontario), Canada

12) Nichelle Nichols: Robbins, Ill., USA

Belushi and Carrey played parodies of Captain Kirk on tv.

*-Javier the Intern is a fictional character

#-Actors who are now deceased

http://www.startrek.com

http://www.trekweb.com

Happy 75th Birthday, Superman

While it is common knowledge that Superman has been played in tv and in film by the likes of Dean Cain, Brandon Routh, the late Christopher Reeve and the late George Reeves, it is not commonly known that he was also played by the late Turkish actor Tayfun Demir  (pictured here) in the 1979 rip-off film "Superman Donuyor/The Return of Superman").

Superman first appeared in Action Comics #1 on April 18, 1938, and according to the Overstreet Comic Book Guide, it is worth (in mint condition) a staggering $1.75 million.

One can find considerably newer "Superman" comic books at places like Acme Comics in Greensboro, NC, or Chapel Hill Comics, which is just down I-40 in Chapel Hill, NC.

One famous quote from "Superman" comic books comes in Justice League or America #4, where Superman tells Wonder Woman: "I can only tell you what I believe, Diana: humankind has to be allowed to climb to its own destiny. We can't carry them there."

SIDEBAR: There is yet another tragic development from the Boston Marathon bombing incident on Monday as a third person Lingzi Lu, a Chinese national who was a student at Boston University, died from injuries sustained in the blast.

Another Chinese student from the school Danling Zhou, who was with Lu near the finish line, was seriously injured. The Boston University web site reported that Robert Hill, the dean of Marsh Chapel at BU, visited Zhou and said that she was successfully recovering from surgery at the Boston Medical Center.

Our thoughts go out to all the victims of this horrible act of terrorism.

http://www.acmecomics.com

http://www.chapelhillcomics.com

http://www.bu.edu

The Best Films of 2012 (in my view)

Yes, it has been a long time since we last blogged, and we have broken many promises. But, Feb. 15th is the traditional date in which we list our 20 favorite films that were released in America from the previous year.

I should point out that this year I am going with films that were released in our market area as opposed to films that came to New York.

There are, as always, many films we have not seen, including the three Ls: "Lincoln," "Life of Pi" and "Les Misreables." 

This year, I am pleased to add that Bilge Ebiri, a fellow Turkish-American who is a New York-based film critic who voted in the "Film Comment" best films of the year survey, and I agree that the Turkish film "Once Upon a Time in Anatolia" from director Nuri Bilge Ceylan was the best film of the year. The "Film Comment" survey chose the French film "Holy Motors" as the best film of the year; "The Master" came in second and it was the highest-ranking American film on the list.

Speaking of lists, here is ours:

*-Films that were released after Jan. 1, 2012, in our market.

#-Films which have been nominated for Best Picture Oscar

%-Films ranked in the top 20 of the "Film Comment" survey

1. "Once Upon a Time in Anatolia" (Turkey, see second image) %

2. "We Need to Talk About Kevin"*

3. "Jiro:Dreams of Sushi" (documentary; third image)

4. "The Perks of Being a Wallflower" (first image)

5. "Silver Linings Playbook"#%

6. "Zero Dark Thirty"#%

7. "Argo" #

8. "A Separation" (Iran)*

9. "Django Unchained" #

10. "The Kid with a Bike" (France) %

11. Pina (documentary) *

12. "Beasts of the Southern Wild" #%

13. "The Dark Knight Returns"

14. "Damsels in Distress"

15. "Robot and Frank"

16. "Skyfall"

17. "Arbitrage"

18. "Moonrise Kingdom"%

19. "The Master" %

20. "Haywire"


 http://www.filmlinc.org

Chuck vs. Cuneyt (4 of 6)_ The Octagon

Today, we continue our quiz series with trivia questions regarding American action movie star of yesteryear Chuck Norris, 72 and his Turkish counterpart matinee idol Cuneyt Arkin, 75. For obvious reasons, neither men are kicking butt on screen these days.

For this week's question, we ask which actor won the Best Oscar in 1980 when the Norris vehicle "The Octagon," which I remember was being shown at the Towers Theatre in my hometown of Roanoke, Va., which is alas a shoe store today.

Was the winner?"

A) Robert Deniro

B) Dustin Hoffman

C) John Hurt

D) Jack Nicholson

E) Donald Sutherland


The answer to last week's question was C) George C. Scott

And, good morning to those of you in Dubai where we believe it's now 10:00 a.m., Monday morning.

SIDEBAR: Here are the correct answers to our "Dexter" series:

1) D

2) A

3) C

4) B

http://www.chucknorris.com

http://www.cuneytarkin.com.tr

Chuck Norris vs. Cuneyt Arkin (3 of 6)_ The Romatik Cuneyt

It is midnight here in New York (not really where I am at), 8:00 a.m. in Dubai, high noon in Hong Kong and 2:00 p.m. in Sydney, where ever you are you are with the Daily Vampire.

Today, we continue our series with a look at the careers of two vintage action film actors, Cuneyt Arkin of Turkey and his lesser-know counterpart (yeah, we are being sarcastic) Chuck Norris.

Arkin, now age 75, who is three years older than Norris, was also known as Cuneyt Baba (Father Cuneyt) in Tukey. He also made a lot of romantic films with Turkish screen goddess Turkan Soray, now age 67. In 1970 alone, they made many films together. One of my personal favorites is "Hayatim Sana Feda/My Life Belongs to You, Feda."

The film is patterned after Douglas Sirk melodramas from the 1950s, such as "Magnificent Obsession" and "Written in the Wind," which usually starred the late Rock Hudson.

In "Feda," Arkin plays Harun whose reckless driving causes him to hit the car driven by Soray's Zeynep, a character who is a lounge singer. She goes blind from the accident, and a guilty Harun tries to make it up to her. They fall in love. Interestingly enough, this film, came out the year I was born, which was also when "Love Story" became a huge box-office hits and one of the most questionable Best Picture nominees.

So, as we always do with these entries, we are asking which actor won the Best Oscar in 1970, the year of the 'romatik Cuneyt' (in Turkish, romantic is spelled with a 'k'). Is the answer:

A) Ryan O'Neal

B) John Wayne

C) George C. Scott

D) Jack Nicholson

E) Robert Redford

Incidentally, it is now 7:00 a.m. in Istanbul, Turkey.


The answer to last week's entry was B) F. Murray Abraham; he won the Best Actor Oscar for "Amadeus" in 1984, when Norris made "Missing in Action."

http://www.politicscultureandotherwastesoft.blogspot.com

http://www.cuneytarkin.com.tr

http://www.chucknorris.com

Cuneyt Arkin vs. Chuck Norris_ (1 of 4)

We were going to dedicate a blog entry to Turkish action movie star and matinee idol Cuneyt Arkin on Friday, which was his 75th birthday, but we fell asleep in the Salt Lake City Public Library (yes, that is a joke!; we don't even live in Utah).

Arkin is best-known in the West for his 1982 film "Dunyayi Kurtaran Adami/The Man Who Saved the World," which is more commonly known as "The Turkish Star Wars."

But, we are going to refer back to 1974 when Arkin starred in a film with Turkish starlet Fatma Girkik titled "Once Vatan," it was about a Turkish solider who goes back to Cyprus to fight the Greeks all by himself, and, of course, Cuneyt wins.


So, we are going to simply ask which actor won an Oscar for Best Actor in 1974, the year this film, which I saw circa 1993 on the TRT  (Turkish Radio Television), while I was in Antalya, Turkey.

Is the answer?:

A) Art Carney

B) Jack Nicholson

C) Gene Hackman

D) Dustin Hoffman

E) Al Pacino

We will have the answer in a few short days....

http://www.cuneytarkin.com.tr/

http://www.chucknorris.com

http://www.politicscultureandotherwastesoft.blogspot.com (for an entry on Chuck Norris)

http://www.slcpl.org (The Salt Lake City Public Library; it is quite a nice building, actually)

The Last Ten Films I've Seen-Chuck Norris and Orson Welles

Here are the last 10 films I've seen, as of tonight. One thing seems certain in life, one never knows when they will view what films for whatever reason! This list is inspired by a series that runs in "Film Comment" magazine, in which well-known people in the film industry, usually directors, list the last ten films they've seen. Quentin Tarantino's list from a few years ago was very interesting, but it's not around here 'at the office.' I do recall he had seen lots of Asian films. As of late, we have not?! Here is the list:

1. Bully (doc. 2011. Dir.-Lee Hirsch)

2. Raising Cain (1992. Dir.- Brain DePalma)

3. Force of One (1979. Dir.-Paul Aaron w/Chuck Norris)

4. Boats Out of Watermelon Rinds (Turkey. 2004. Dir-Ahmet Ulucay, the director died at a relative young age at 59 in 2009).

5. Damsels in Distress (2011. Dir-Whit Stillman)

6. The Third Generation (Germany. 1979. Dir.- R.W. Fassbinder)

7. Me and Orson Welles (2008. Dir.-Richard Linklater)

8. They Live (1988. Dir-John Carpenter)

9. Brewster McCloud (1971. Dir-Robert Altman)

10. Tower Heist (2011. Dir-Bret Rattner).

http://www.filmlinc.com

The Last 10 Films I've Seen_ Project Nim Stands Out

Here are the last ten films I've seen; I will write a brief commentary on some of the films after they have been listed:

1. "The Tillman Story (doc. 2010. Dir-Amir Bar-Lev)

2. *Project Nim (doc. 2011. Dir- James Marsh)

3. *The Guard (Ireland. 2011. Dir-John Michael McDonagh)

4. Man Push Cart (2005. Dir- Ramin Bahrani)

5. The Stoning of Soraya M. (2008. With Farsi subtitles. Dir-Cyrus Nowrasteh)

6. Days and Nights (Egypt. 1955. Dir-Henry Barakat)

7. Benny's Video (Austria. 1992. Dir- Michael Haneke)

8. * Another Earth (2011. Dir- Mike Cahill)

9. #% Summer Love/O Da Beni Seviyor (Turkey. 2001. Dir- Baris Pirhasan)

10. Bhutto (doc. 2010. Dir-Duane Baughman)

*-Films I saw at a cinema

#-Previously viewed film

%- Not released in the United States

Many of the films I saw dealt with the Middle East or Central Asia in one form or another.

One of the exceptions is film number two "Project Nim," yet another amazing documentary from the director of "Man on Wire." Like his last film, this one also deals with radical risks and the obstacles they pose for those who undertake them. In this case, those risk-takers are a group of people, as opposed to one man in particular, as the film examines the reasons why many people tried to humanize a chimp named Nim and the results which ensued.

The fifth film "The Stoning of Soraya M." is an American movie by a right-wing director who had helmed the highly controversial "Path to 9-11" tv docudrama. This time he surprisngly takes on human rights and female oppression, two subjects that have been usually involved liberal filmmakers. Though no one would argue that the stoning executions of women in Iran for alleged infidelities are ever justified irregardless if the woman engaged in such affairs or not, the film felt very much like a '70s Turkish melodrama with a forced script and considerable over-acting. Nonetheless, since the film has a 7.9 rating on the IMDB, it apparently has its fans.

"Benny's Video" is yet another wonderful and disturbing film by Michael Haneke, which was the director's second film. Like both versions of "Funny Games," this film explores how fake violence on tv and in film can influence young people towards dasterdly deeds.

"Summer Love" has its production flaws, as is common in Turkish cinema, but it is a moving coming of age story with brilliant cinematography and tremendous acting by its young cast. And, unlike most films from my late father's country, this one actually has a happy ending!

Last Ten Films I've Seen

Here are the last ten films I've seen, films I've seen before these viewings are marked with an asteriks (*) and films I saw in a movie theatre are marked with an exclamation point (!):

1) "Les Bonnes Femmes" (1960. France. dir-Claude Chabrol)

2) "The Baader Meinhof Complex" (2008. Germany. dir-Uli Edel)

3) "The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest" (2009. Sweden. dir-Daniel Alfredson)

4)*! "Time Bandits" (1981. dir-Terry Gilliam)

5) "A Psycho Love Story" (2008. Turkey. dir-Biray Dalkiran)

6) ! "Beginners" (2010. dir-Mike Mills)

7) * "Marie Antoinette" (2006. dir-Sofia Coppola)

8) "Sounds Like Teen Spirit" (2008. doc. dir-Jamie Jay Johnson)

9) "The Big Uneasy" (2010. doc. dir-Harry Shearer)

10) "A Tale of Springtime" (1990. France. dir-Eric Rohmer)

Notes on films on this list:

1) This early French New Wave film about attractive young Parisian women has a very surreal ending which has become a discussion board topic on the IMDB, and after seeing the film I certainly understand why.

2) Perhaps, the most interesting film on the list. The German film, which was nominated for a Best Foreign Language Film Oscar, is about the radical left-wing terrorist group RFA, which started in then West Berlin in 1970. The group was responsible for political assasinations, kidnapping and an airplane hijacking that went across three continents, so this story is quite epic in tone and in my view, the film delivers. Interestingly enough, surviing RFA member Horst Mahler has now gone to the far-right, so much so that he was imprisoned (again) in Germany for being a Holocaust denier.

3) The Swedish film based on the last of the Millenium triology novels by Stieg Larsson seems quite timely given the heinous actions of the far-right, radical Christian terrorist suspect in Norway on Friday. Larsson researched far-right groups in Sweden and other Scandanavian countries before his own untimely death in 2004, and that is reflected in the novels he wrote as well as their filmed versions.

4) I forgot how dark the ending of this 'children's film' from Terry Gilliam was. I saw it at the Salem Valley-4 (now Salem Valley-8 back when the film was first released when I was a child).

5) Yes, as one might expect from the film's title (it was actually called "Heaven" in Turkey), it is a very strange movie, but the director's earlier effort "The Abortion" is even more over-the-top than this film.

6) Christopher Plummer will hopefully win an Oscar for his great performance in this film.

7) This Sofia Coppola film seems slightly better with the second viewing.

8) This doc follows teens in Cyprus, Georgia, Bulgaria and Belgium as they try to be the next European teen idol.

9) An interesting environmental doc from Harry Shearer, best-known for voicing Simpsons characters like Principal Seymour Skinner.

10) This is a typical Rohmer film, which means those of us who generally like his films will like it, everyone else might opt to watch infommercials, pro wrestling or radical televangelists praying for a new hot tub.

The Last Ten Film I've Seen- Some Controversial Films

Here are the last ten films I've seen as of 5:00 p.m., Hartford, Connecticut time (not where I reside) on Wednesday.

They are:

1. "Hidden" (2009. Norway. dir-Pal Oie)_ This is a bad Norwegian horror film.

2. "Irreversible" (2002. France. dir- Gaspar Noe). Along "Antichrist," this is perhaps the most controversial made within the last ten years. Except for the opening sequence, this is a relatively well-made film though.

3. "13 Assasins." (2010. Japan. dir- Takashi Miike). This is my favorite film from Miike who directed "Audition," which I should have mentioned along with "Irreverseible" and "Antichrist."

4. "Puppetmaster II" (1991. dir-Dave Allen). The sequel is actually better than the original! But, these aren't exactly exceptional films, by any means.

5. "Puppetmaster" (1989.dir-David Schmoeller). We featued an image of Klaus Kinski in this entry because the evil puppet Blade in this series is based on him!

6. "No One Killed Jessica." (2001. India. dir-Raj Kumar Gupta)_ This is like a Bollywood version of "All the President's Men."

7. "Angel's Fall" (2005. Turkey. dir- Semih Kaplanoglu) An earlier film from the director of "Bal/Honey," that is fairly similar in tone to his more recent film which has been a film festival hit.

8. "C.R.A.Z.Y" (2005. Canada. dir-Jean Mar Vallee). This is an exceptional French-language Canadian film with a very expensive soundtrack with songs by Pink Floyd, David Bowie, The Rolling Stones, and Hot Chocolate.

9. "Midnight in Paris" (2011. dir- Woody Allen). Yes, I thought it was good.

10. Rubber (2010. France. dir-Quentin Dupieux). This is actually an English-language film shot in California about a killer tire. We're still not sure what to make of it!

The Last 10 Films I've Seen

In order, and without commentary (it was hard enough to download the images, and it is getting veyr, very late here, but I will add a five-star scale with the films), the films are:

1. Tree of Life (2011. Dir. Terence Malick. With Brad Pitt and Sean Penn. *****)

2. Power and the Passion (1957. Dir. Stanley Kramer. With Frank Sinatra, Cary Grant and Sophia Loren. **1/2)

3. Advise and Consent (1962. Dir- Otto Preminger. With Henry Fonda. ***1/2).

4. The Third Page (1999. Turkey. Dir- Zeki Demirkubuz. ****).

5. 11 Harrowhouse (1974, Dir- Aram Avakian. W/Charles Grodin and Candace Bergen. **1/2).

6. Of Time and the City (2008. doc. Dir- Terence Davies. ***1/2).

7. The Beyond (1981. Italy. Dir- Lucio Fulci ***).

8. Masculine/Feminine (1966. France. Dir- Jean-Luc Godard. *****).

9. The Phatom Carriage (1921. Sweden. Dir- Victor Sjostrom. ****).

10. Eraserhead (1977. Dir-David Lynch. ***1/2).

Last Ten Films I've Seen....'Malcolm' in the Middle

Contrary to this image of Malcolm McDowell, Stanley Kubrick's surreal masterpiece "A Clockwork Orange" (1971) is NOT among the last ten films I've seen. But, I did see the three-hour against-the-grain musical comedy/political satire "O Lucky Man!"
(1973, dir-Lindsay Anderson) which McDowell actually consders his favorite film.

Here is the rest of the list:

1. "Suzanne's Career"* (France. 1963. dir-Eric Rohmer)
2. "Zulum/Cruelty" **(Turkey. 1972. w/Turkan Soray. dir-Atif Yilmaz)
3. "O Lucky Man!" (UK. 1973. w/Malcolm McDowell. dir-Lindsay Anderson)
4. "Punishment Park" (1971. dir-Peter Watkins).
5. "Wanda" (1970. dir-Barbara Loden)
6. "A Man for All Seasons" (1966. w/Paul Schroder and Robert Shaw. dir-Fred Zinneman)
7. "Lifespan" (Holland. 1976. w/Klaus Kinski. dir-Sandy Whitelaw)
8. "Prince of Persia" (2010. dir-Mike Newell)
9. "Yazgi/Fate)"** (Turkey. 2001. dir-Zeki Demirkubuz"
10. "The Fugitive Kind" (1959. w/Marlon Brando. dir-Sidney Lumet).

*-Not a full-feature length film
**-Not distributed in the United States

Here are some notes on the other films in the list:

"Suzanne's Career" is the second film in Rohmer's "Moral Tales" series, which includes what many consider to be his best film- "Claire's Knee" (1971).

"Zulum/Cruelty" is a vintage Turkish melodrama with a very young Turkan Soray who is known as the 'Queen of Turkish cinema.' It makes for an excellent guilty pleasure, but needless to say it was not a challenger to Luis Bunuel's French film "The Discrete Charm of the Bourgeoisie" which deservedly won the Best Foreign-Language film Oscar in 1972.

"Punishment Park" is a docudrama based on the 'siege mentality' concept. Along with the documentary "FTA" with Jane Fonda, it is one of several Vietnam War-era films which were effectively banned in America for political reasons. In the film, anti-war protestors choose to go to Punishment Park where they must capture an American flag on top of a mountain as opposed to federal prison. But, they soon find out that with armed law enforcement officers trailing them that they made the wrong choice.

"Lifespan" is vintage kitsch, and Kinski's appearance in the film makes it even more so. The plot is bascially this: "A doctor trying to develop a serum to strengthen his life tries his formula on nursing home residents.' Pardon the cliche, but this is definitely NOT for all tastes. In fact, I'm wondering if the film even offended me!

"Yazgi/Fate" is based on the novel "The Stranger" by the late French writer Albert Camus. The film by Zeki Demirkubuz, one of Turkey's most acclaimed directors, deal with the ramifications of nilihism as the title character is presumed guilty of a crime he did not commit because of his emotional detachment to the victims.

Lastly, "The Fugitive Kind," which is based on the Tennessee Williams play "Orphesus Descending" features four Oscar-winners. In addition, to Brando, the erotic for its time film has Anna Magnani, Joanne Woodward and Maureen Stapleton in its cast--all of whom won Oscars during their carreers. Woodward is the only one of the four who is still alive. Magnani, who became famous for her performance in the Italian classic "Open City" reportedly lusted after Brando, but he was not romantically interested in her.