Film
Iraq’s New Flag + Photo Contest & Film Festival
Iraq has issued a call to artists in and outside of Iraq to design the country’s new flag. There is still controversy over the current flag that was voted on in January. The three stars from the regime of Saddam Hussein’s days were stripped but the Arabic script for “God is great” was left in the current design but represented in a different way. Here’s the background story for further explanation if you’d like to take the opportunity. The deadline to submit a design is by the end of September. Here’s another artistic opportunity, the Akron Art Museum in Ohio has launched a low fidelity (lomographic) photo contest. The deadline…
Weight or Flight?
I saw the movie The Diving Bell and the Butterfly a few weeks ago and I’m still thinking about it — a sign for me of good movie. It is about the unfortunate stroke of Jean Dominique Bauby, the editor of French Elle, which left him paralyzed and with “locked-in” syndrome at age 43 — unable to move except for his left eyelid. His speech therapist devised a way for him to communicate by blinking his eye when a certain letter was spoken as she ran down a list of most commonly used letters. Once the letter was established, she could guess what word he was trying to say and…
The Fall
Although the movie, The Fall, is not as visually stunning as Hero (one of my favorites), the heightened dream set imagery adds to this delightful and eerie tale. Lee Pace, from Pushing Daisies, portrays Roy, the stuntman who is recovering in a 1920’s California hospital after a “bad” suicidal fall. He’s depressed over his lost love’s affections for the leading actor during the shooting of his cowboy movie. He meets the five year old Alexandria, played by seven year old Romanian actress Catrinca Untaro, quite by accident as her note misplaces its landing and flies into his room. Upon her retrieval of the note, he proceeds to tell her a…
