"Jane Eyre" by Cary Fukunaga (2011)

Far more realistic and powerful depiction of what life for governess must have been than 1940. "All this and Heaven too" is this unexpectedly beautiful interpretation of literary classic and its surprising that it works so well on every level, because adaptations of famous novels are slippery business since most of us are very familiar with them and have our own ideas how they should be approached. One wrong step and everything can slide in overtly simplistic direction, luckily BBC Films are generally always at the top of their game when it comes to costume drama, so this "Jane Eyre" was fairly safe bet, even though advertisements might have harmed it as they promoted it almost as a horror when in fact it is a beautiful period drama with strong Gothic overtones. 

The novel by Charlotte Brontë is a beauty apart in itself and it should be enjoyed as timeless masterpiece it is - modern readers might have problems with understanding what a joyless and uncertain lives one governess was destined to live all her life, floating from employment to employment in constant fear of poverty and scandal, but this 2011. version might be the closest to my idea of 1847. novel with highly atmospheric candle lights, sophisticated but never intrusive background music and of course, beautifully understated acting. Mia Wasikowska is quiet and mousy enough to be absolutely believable as girl whose pureness and innocence soften the heart of tortured Mr. Rochester, with only stoic posture and expressive eyes on her disposal she does admirable job and with time we come to see the beauty in her. Even though this kind of role now appears like cliché in every costume drama, we have to understand that "Jane Eyre" actually started the whole tradition of a brooding hero and Michael Fassbender is magnificent because he takes Mr. Rochester without any sense of campy exaggeration, he is dead serious and genuinely sincere. As a housekeeper, Judi Dench does magic with basically small, supporting role and the way she twists her hands or glances sideways while speaking bring the movie completely different dimension. Casting is absolutely perfect and the smallest details in roles by Sally Hawkins as evil cousin, Imogen Poots (snooty Blanche Ingram) and beautiful Italian actress Valentina Cervi are flawless. Some might complain that certain aspects of the novel were ignored but honestly, the real story starts with heroine's arrival in Thornfield Hall anyway, everything before that was just a prelude. I was sincerely touched with the movie, it really affected me even though I was very familiar with the story.

"All This, and Heaven Too" by Anatole Litvak (1940)

Based on a real-life story where public scandal subsequently paved the way for political turmoil in France, this is highly sanitised account of it as presented trough thick gauze of Hollywood filters and re-packaged as sentimental melodrama. The truth of it all has been obscured with time and even the novel that inspired the script (by Rachel Field) was probably just well intentioned interpretation but one has to admire scriptwriters willingness to deal with potentially sordid subject and serve it as glittering box with a decorative bow on the top. 

Aloof, sophisticated Duke (regal Charles Boyer) and his neurotic wife (Barbara O'Neil, otherwise remembered as mother of Scarlett in "Gone with the Wind") live in a cold, loveless marriage just for the sake of appearances in society, while we are to understand that procession of servants, housekeepers and teachers take care of their offspring (bunch of sugary, well-behaved and totally unreal children who seem to conform to Hollywood standards of how kids should be depicted, with nice turn by little Virginia Weidler from "The Women"). The arrival of a new governess brings instantly some music, joy and happiness in the household and Duchess goes berserk with jealousy, with tragic results. Truth to be told, even though the movie leans over backwards in attempt to suggest otherwise, her husband does appear sadistic in his coldness towards wife and nothing in the world can explain or redeem his behaviour - if she was good enough to bore him all that children, he could show some gentleness and understanding to her. Warner Bros. makes a mind-boggling decision to give he role of a meek, submissive and self-sacrificing governess to world's most famous gargoyle Bette Davis who does her job admirably but we can sense tension in every single scene and occasional flash of anger, quick but noticeable glance in those expressive eyes clearly show this is all just an act, we know this can't be real and even though Mademoiselle is portrayed as utterly angelic, blameless and pure, we hold our breath expecting her to chew everybody out. Movie was a huge success in its time and meticulous care was taken of its cellophane (costumes, lavish production) but what stayed with me was the question what the life of governess must have been, not quite servant but not much better either, depending on whims of employers and living in constant fear of poverty. 

"His Girl Friday" by Howard Hawks (1940)

All hail Rosalind Russell - she might be a Hollywood legend but I have just discovered her recently in "The Women" and noticed what a attractive woman she was, despite unflattering costumes, hats, glasses and all, in fact everything possible was done in order to make her appear humpty-dumpty for the role, but it didn't fool me and I knew she was great, classic beauty obviously hamming it up in order not to eclipse main actress. Russel and not Cary Grant (for whom I couldn't care less) was the main reason why I decided to check out this movie and it was great fun.

"His Girl Friday" is deservedly a classic and its strange that it took me forever to actually watch it, because its basically right up my alley as I love nothing better than old black & white movies that get me roaring with laughter. Sharp wit, banter and non-stop fast talking is out of this world and occasionally my head was ready to explode from all this overload of punch lines - movie is also unrepentantly subversive, because it pokes fun at everyone from opportunistic journalists to corrupted politicians. Unlike movies today, there is not a single scene with moralistic brainwashing or messages about peace, love & understanding - hard boiled characters here are tough as nails and follow only their own interests, even when they are pretending to be interested in welfare of others. Grant and Russell are divorced journalist couple pulled into madcap crime case that its just too irresistible and during the continuous mayhem they shout themselves hoarse (often yelling at the top of each other) while all sorts of people run in and out of police station. There is a missed opportunity to elaborate little more on a relationship between convicted murderer and his sweetheart but this might be intentionally as it would take focus away from the main stars who are electric, chemistry between them just sizzle. Unfortunate, boring fiancé (Ralph Bellamy) is just perfect for the role and his mother (Alma Kruger) is delightful. Unforgettable comedy that got me spurting my wine all over the place and this is very unusual as generally I rarely find comedies genuinely funny, but this one was a hoot. I was glued to the screen, chuckling and laughing all the way. 

Eurovision hidden gems ... continues!

The very first LP album that I ever bought with some pocket money was double LP titled "Eurovision winners 1956-1981" and it shows what a good little boy I was, when what appealed to me was nothing remotely rebellious or angry but a very tame, old-fashioned compilation that for some reason called my name. No doubt, little kids today would go for some rap or head-splitting rhythms but cute, little goodie two shoes wanted and got himself a compilation of Eurovision winners that got me swooning to radio oldies. Today I find this incredibly cute and surely it defined my later music taste that privately always tended to lean towards easy listening even though from time to time I try to branch elsewhere and in my fact my music collection has everything from Jaco Pastorius to Willie Nelson and Muddy Waters but sooner or later I will eventually go back to Eurovision and its archives. Out from sheer curiosity I did some research who else performed on these stages besides the winners and trough last few years discovered some wonderfully obscure favourites, whom I tried to highlight in previous posts but what really delighted me were earliest decades - the moment when I arrived in 1980s music didn't really excite me anymore and it could be the ubiquitous synthesisers dampened my enthusiasm but now I discovered another twist to my research: cover versions of Eurovision songs as recorded by contemporary international artists in their languages. Not just winners (that would be expected) but all the wonderful, less known material that appealed to various audiences and was translated & repackaged everywhere from Estonia to Hungary. I actually didn't have idea that Eurovision had such strong effect and impact all over the continent.

First surprise was French cover of Swiss 1956. winner "Refrain" that I know all my life as recorded by Lys Assia, who recorded it in both French and German but apparently it was recorded instantly by French artist Cora Vaucaire and she gives it such a beautiful, particularly French tenderness & charm that its absolutely delightful, sounds as completely new song. In her hands its a smoky, old-fashioned French chanson like something Édith Piaf would have done.

"Net als toen" was covered (amongst others) in Germany by Margot Eskens who sounds so much like Vera Lynn to me that I actually had to check out who is singing. Melody is still close enough to original, but its just exciting to hear it now upside down in another language.

Nora Brockstedt from Norway had her go at French 1958. winner "Dors mon amour" and its still same song but sounds very pretty in this unusual language + she had truly beautiful voice that is joy to hear. She actually had her own Eurovision moment just a few years later, although another singer from Norway (Inger Jacbsen) might be my favourite from what I heard so far.

In Finland, Seija Karpiomaa had covered contagious 1959. Dutch swinging winner and she is lovely although the original was far more coquettish and kittenish - Karpiomaa had different, more womanly and sonorous voice that might strange at first, but she swings admirably and its just great fun to hear the song in another language.

1960. winner "Tom Pillibi" always sounded too much like some children cartoon theme to my ears to take it seriously and no wonder Julie Andrews recorded it herself, because it could have been Disney music but Spanish artist José Guardiola did admirable job singing in Catalan and I genuinely love it for the sheer novelty of it. There is equally cute version as recorded by Dutch artist, than very young Willeke Alberti who sounds just like original.

A song that didn't win and even failed to get my interest initially from 1961. was covered by Dutch duo Die Blue Diamonds as "Ahoi Ohe" and I find it so infectious that now I wonder what was I thinking when I didn't notice it before. Its a beautiful, sunny little joy of a song, very uplifting and shoe tapping. 

Another song that I didn't notice before was this one from 1962. recorded as "Ring-Dingeding" by Dutch guy called Hans Boskamp and it sounds so sweetly innocent & featherlight in the best sense of the word, that I find it irresistible. The biggest Eurovision loser that year was German "Zwei kleine Italiener" that sounded as a surefire winner but that one was covered so many times that I eventually found it annoying, even though there is a nice Spanish version by Gelu.

Danish 1963. winner "Dansevise" is deservedly a classic and personally I think its one of the prettiest songs ever performed on Eurovision, here covered by duo from Estonia and they are fine, although slightly less seductive - note by note it follows the original, but the fact that its a different voice makes it shade less brilliant. That was one of the strongest years in history of Eurovision and I particularly love Spanish José Guardiola with "Es maravilloso" which was cover of UK entry. 

... to be continued!

"The Pit and the Pendulum" by Roger Corman (1961)

Sometimes old movies are just old and there is nothing redeeming about them.

Its really interesting why today we can watch 1922. "Nosferatu" with fascination, but the moment we arrive in bright-coloured 1960s, something is off and paradoxically, latest movies are much more dated than their distant ancestors. The whole era of German expressionism is still perfectly capable to give me nightmares, while what is now accepted as golden and classic horrors of 1960s just don't do it for me, no matter how influential and celebrated they might be. Its not just the bright colours, sets or overacting, everything appears artificial and even this is something often done intentionally, I start to feel fidgety and wonder how much longer do I have to suffer trough this.

"The Pit and the Pendulum" has been praised to the skies as one of the most influential horror movies of the early 1960s - be it as it may, it creaks and squeaks all over the place, showing its age and how much we progressed since than. I could imagine that it might perhaps be very effective if watched on a stormy night somewhere, but I gave it proper chance - tried initially, just to continue next evening with resignation - with results that were only mildly interesting. With exception of scene or two, it was all terribly dated, including unconvincing script, wooden acting and overload of thick cobwebs covering what it appears as labyrinth of leftover scenery from other movies. John Kerr is a young aristocrat who arrives in a gloomy castle to find out about the mysterious death of his sister, whose grieving husband (over the top Vincent Price) roams around, supported by his sister (unconvincing Luana Anders) and a doctor (Antony Carbone) - there is a lot of dialogue, screams in the night and stairways that go to the bottomless abyss but the final results were just too silly to analyse in depth. It reminds me on so many movies from my childhood that once used to scare me to death, but now just appear silly. 

Studio 54

Photo: Pam Grier in early 1970s

Old pop festivals: Zagreb '71

Of all the music festival LP albums, this is one I have seen the most on shelves around the homes I visited - it's almost spooky, but this particular recording was omnipresent and apparently very, very popular at the time or it was simply the moment when these events caught up with records buyers. As foreign releases were usually slow coming, homegrown pop composers and artists (derivative as they might have been) were enjoying some really big sales and music festivals like this one were major events of the year. Every official LP like this one always had at least a dozen hit singles accompanying it, so nowadays its impossible to grasp the whole picture without those singles and if anyone ever decide to re-issue Zagreb '71 again, hit singles would have to be bonus tracks.

It was still a very important and venerable music institution at the time, with good selection of veterans and upcoming young talents competing on the same stage. Grandfather Ivo Robić opens the record with his typical ode to Zagreb, while Zvonko Špišić and Stjepan "Jimmy" Stanić represented generation from a previous decade but for the most part it was a showcase for new names - Krunoslav Slabinac, Duško Lokin, Đani Maršan and Vjekoslav Jutt were all just kids and they were actually very good. Great Vice Vukov was so popular at the time that he got two songs - "Tvoja zemlja" and "Spomenar" but by far the biggest hit was written by husband and wife tandem Maja Perfiljeva & Hrvoje Hegedušić with pop band Pro Arte in mind - one way or another, "Gazi, dragi, srce moje" ended up in hands of gentle Gabi Novak and not only that it turned into one of the major hits of the whole year but its lyrics perfectly suited (and defined) her music persona. As usual, young Josipa Lisac came up with decidedly complex vocal extravaganza ("Mreže ljubavi") that was impressive but deliberately non-commercial and its interesting how just a year later, under new music direction she will actually become a winner of this festival. Its unfortunate that songs by Arsen Dedić, Dalibor Brun, Đorđi Peruzović and few other artists (young Ivo Pattiera!) were released as singles, it would be nice to have them in one place to complete the picture.

Photographer: Ivica Jakovljević

Last evening, completely by chance, I have discovered the most beautiful online photo gallery with works by certain Ivica Jakovljević and his magic pictures of Zagreb, its corners, nooks and crannies really moved me to tears. Now, as I already noted here on this blog, the fact that I was born and raised in Zagreb usually leave me quite indifferent - I accept it as my birthplace but its not necessarily a hometown, partly because there is no living family to keep me here, partly because my nomadic life led me elsewhere around the world and I have discovered at least dozen other places where I feel comfortable, happy and even excited, while good old Zagreb somehow always feel dirty, grey and full of graffiti. I am perfectly aware that its my own psychological block that keeps me from relaxing in these familiar surroundings - or perhaps its true, I have no emotional ties to this city - why else I feel completely at peace in far away places instead on the street where I grew up, however I always loved old black & white photographs of bygone era until now.

Mr. Jakovljević is artist - not even born in Zagreb, by the way - who has such a beautiful gift, its almost poetry set in images and because he has a wonderful heart, he sees details and beauty in places that most of the people would just walk by without noticing colors everywhere. I find very interesting that he was born elsewhere and later got transplanted to Zagreb, since it shows that his inner compass works no matter where he finds himself. He could be in Siberia or inner Mongolia and surely he would still discover amazing scenes there. On these pictures of Zagreb he depicted beauty that he found in everyday life and I was so genuinely moved that I almost purred with pleasure for recognizing places that under normal circumstances I wouldn't look twice. My first immediate reaction was to share this photos with all my friends from Zagreb who might enjoy this (they were sincerely delighted) and than snuggled comfortably for the rest of Sunday evening with these pictures, I couldn't give myself a better present. I even complimented the guy who responded graciously. What a beautiful artist and truly spiritual person. It actually made me look on my town with fresh eyes.

Soul Train

Thanks to wonders of Internet, now I am able to pursue hobbies in a way that as a kid I could never imagine it would have been possible: I still remember how, as impressionable teenager who loved pop music but lacking any literature about it, I would visit libraries in US and British embassies and browse music encyclopedias from their shelves, huge volume of collected Rolling Stone essays on my lap and me in seventh heaven, not exactly sure what it all means (I basically picked up English completely by myself along the way) and who these people were, but it was all so exciting and they would never let me take these encyclopedias home, it was only to enjoy there - which was probably even better because the more I loved certain books, bigger were the chances that I would splash my lunch all over the pages (it happens even today). But now I can roll lazily in my bed on a Sunday morning and browse youtube while enjoying legendary performances from 1970s TV show Soul Train - at that time it was ultra cool newest twist on famous dance marathons from previous decade (you know, where audiences surrounded performers and danced around them, shrieking and being absolutely fabulous in their newest clothes) with idea to promote exclusively soul music and its performers. With exception of David Bowie I have not seen another white artists on that stage and generally it was a showcase for soul royalty - at first I couldn't get my eyes off awesome Aretha Franklin doing "Rock Steady" and her fabulous backing singers who were just incredibly charismatic, I must have watched that one particular clip hundreds of times because it was like some perfect dream of what real soul performance should be but eventually I dived into the rest of archival material and voilà, just discovered my new favourite.

This particular performance (live! no lip-synch!) by Harold Melvin And The Blue Notes is so dazzlingly perfect, brilliant and incredibly powerful that I just couldn't believe my eyes and ears. Not only that song is incredibly beautiful - I knew it from before, as Dusty Springfield recorded it originally and long time ago it had a profound effect on me during particular episode of my life but now I am able to simply glance back and wonder how on earth could I have been so young to confuse lust and love - though I have never heard it in this version, which is funny since these guys had much bigger hit with it. So I am grooving to a song and just soaking in the wonderful vocal flow between not two, but three spectacular vocalists, while backing dancers are doing some genuinely hypnotic moves and its almost too much for me, I don't even know where to look and whom to focus on - damn! what a show! - slowly though, its clear that tall guy is really powerful and naturally now I must do some research, who on earth is this? It turns out he was Teddy Pendergrass whom I remember vaguely, of course this is all long before my time and now I really have to dig deep in my music collection and wonder why I never explored Philly Sound, naturally I have some Gamble & Huff somewhere, so right now I am listening compilation "The Philly Sound: Kenny Gamble, Leon Huff And The Story Of Brotherly Love (1966-1976)" which is so smooth that its almost unbearable, how strange that I never really paid attention to it and this morning everything just clicked perfectly and it just blew my mind. Even Laura Nyro is on it, wow what a great compilation! This is kind of right before Disco, incredibly sophisticated and slick in the best sense of the word. 

Photo by Henri Cartier-Bresson

              Evocative photo taken in some small caffe years ago, it could be any place, any time

"A Royal Scandal" by Ernst Lubitsch & Otto Preminger (1945)

For all her fame and notoriety, Tallulah Bankhead left just a handful of movies behind and majority of people nowadays might be familiar with her only as inspiration for Walt Disney's villainess Cruella de Vil. Her mannerisms and personality were talk of the day trough the first part of 20th century and it appears she was far busier in theatre than on a silver screen, where her outrageous persona was successfully emulated by Bette Davis who have built her whole career out of strong, intimidating characters that Bankhead played on stage. But where Davis acting always had some dangerous, neurotic edge, under all Bankhead's bravado we suspect heart of gold and some touching vulnerability. The only movie role I have ever seen with her was in 1944 "Lifeboat" by Alfred Hitchcock where she received some of the best reviews of her career, but until now I didn't know anything else with her.

Hilarious romp "A Royal Scandal" is obvious exaggerated satire that has absolutely nothing with real-life historical characters, except using their names. Concerned with entertainment value more than depicting facts, Hollywood already had a long tradition of royalty as caricatures (see Charles Laughton in "The Private Life of Henry VIII") and Catherine the Great - indisputably strong personality and capable ruler in her time - unfortunately had stigma marked upon her by future generations who simply assumed she must have been man-eater, so she made a perfect subject for cinematic topsy-turvy but where previously Marlene Dietrich played her as (what else) seductive temptress, here we have delicious, fast-talking, bantering comedy with so much wit that it overflows the screen. Some say that Greta Garbo was considered for this role, but in my opinion neither Garbo nor Davis could bring what Bankhead delivers here - her Catherine is obviously great connoisseur of handsome men in uniforms but she is at the same time aware of everybody, including her own foibles. Her comic timing is impeccable and she manipulates people like a pro, even though chancellor Charles Coburn almost steals the movie. Young William Eythe as simpleminded soldier who unwittingly becomes empress plaything and Anne Baxter as his fresh-faced fiancee are just cards in a game, all our attention is focused on Bankhead who is supremely entertaining. Somewhere in there, there is a surprising turn of young and dashing Vincent Price who literary have three minutes on a screen and his role could have been explored much more. Funny phrases galore, this now forgotten movie might just delight you with richness of sharp wit and risque humor. 

Robert Doisneau photo

                                       Juliette Greco in Saint-Germain-des-Prés, 1947.

Josipa in the beginning - from a very first magazine cover photo session (1968)

Oh, the joys of vacation and finally freedom to use my time productively and fulfilling, like for example browsing Internet for hours (you didn't expect that I would do such things as walking or going out of the house did you?). Just pottering around without any particular plan or obligations suits me perfectly fine and occasionally I even start thinking that this kind of life might be better than any other option. Unfortunately all this resting sometimes results in too much napping so I find myself fully awake in the middle of the night, amongst vampires and witches (who else would be wide awake at 3 a.m.) so back to Internet browsing again and voilà I discovered a priceless photo (left) that I have searched for decades. I even think that I might know perfectly well where it came from - from the same photo session that resulted with 1968. cover of than very popular "Studio" magazine, as photographed by Marko Čolić and if I am correct this would have been very first time that inimitable Croatian über diva Josipa Lisac appeared on magazine cover. Another, very similar photo (right) was actually placed on front page but the fact that this picture was unknown to me all these years makes it much more fascinating.

That Lisac is, has been and probably forever will be my all-time favourite Croatian music artist is clear to anybody who ever glanced on my blog, but since I am not impressionable teenager anymore, I kind of keep this for myself, specially as she is now more or less accepted as music icon and religious fervour of her fans sometimes genuinely annoys me (when I was growing up, she was still to some extent cult artist, nowadays her admirers faint if I only suggest that not everything she ever recorded was second coming). Of course I know every single recording by heart and trough the years bought them in so many various packages (vinyl, cassette tapes, CD, digital) that its sometimes downright ridiculous but since I am by nature analytical Virgo, can't help but to sometimes mull it over, compare and reassess again why certain music choices were made, could it have been different and who were influences. (Did you know that word fan comes from fanatic?) When it comes to music, Lisac was my first lighthouse and it took me a lifetime to give a proper chance to other artists who worked and existed in very much same time frame; often I see some group pictures taken on festivals or tours and its just mind-boggling how all these people spontaneously and naturally mingled together, even though they all represented completely opposite genres and directions. (It just shows music knows no boundaries) 

What I find so fascinating in this picture is that it depict completely different Lisac than one we are familiar with - for the most of her public life she have been glamorous, collected and slightly intimidating person, every smallest detail in its place, her image so well constructed that we cannot even imagine her living like ordinary people. But the eighteen year old schoolgirl on this photo is adorable in a completely different way - she is light years from confident, authoritative and slightly eccentric person in later life, this tender girl here with touchingly vulnerable face is just at the very start of her professional life and this gentleness makes me want to embrace her protectively. The fact that "Studio" placed her on a magazine cover means that she had already made some impression and "Što me čini sretnom" had everyone falling over themselves praising this new discovery of the year - for a while it even seemed that this will be a forerunner of distinctively new wave of homegrown female singers, as opposite to previously accepted traditional type of professional sufferers who were mostly indistinguishable from each other. It turned out differently - Lisac happened to be one of the kind and experienced rough backlash because of it, but it made her tougher and more resilient to survive in the music business. Later pictures show either cautious or detached look, here she was still living with her parents and like everybody else at the time, was chopping wood for the kitchen oven (as shown in some than-current pictures). This newly discovered photo from 1968. is probably one of my favourite pictures of her.

Old pop festivals: Zagreb '74

Delightful little slice of early 1970s pop music the way it was promoted and presented in than spectacular, new concert hall Vatroslav Lisinski that became venerable institution since, but it must have been a big deal for audiences back than. As opposite to similar festival in Split that embraced and even thrived on mass appeal, music festival in Zagreb strove to keep some sophistication and insisted on certain urban sensitivity that was not always focused on entertaining, hence material pulled from poetry, chansons and ubiquitous tributes to town. 

As expected, there were some big hits that found their way to singles (Duško Lokin, Dalibor Brun) therefore they were not represented on this LP album but for the most part everything worth mentioning is here: whiskey-voiced Darko Domijan, than hot band More from Split, Oliver Dragojević and young Ksenija Erker all had their moments and they were generally very good. Zvonko Špišić and Ibrica Jusić kept things serious, while ladies like Beti Jurković and Elvira Voća had their pleasant but unexceptional turns. Than in his fifties, veteran Ivo Robić obviously had to be included, although neither his style nor music changed one iota since he sang on very first Zagreb festival in 1954. Probably the best of all was a hypnotic ballad by duo Buco i Srđan who had real poem (by Dragutin Tadijanović) set in music and its still lovely song. The most unusual was song not included on LP (it was released as a single) by tandem Ivica Krajač and Karlo Metikoš for über diva Josipa Lisac ("Ostaješ mi samo ti") that has lyrics obviously inspired by 1970 single "Pusti me da spavam".