ANATOLY IVANOV / PROSE / CATEGORIES / PERFORMING ARTS

THE SLOW DEATH OF FILM FESTIVALS?

CINEMA / OUTSIDE NEWS / 2023-11-30

The Clermont-Ferrand Short Film Festival will be reducing the number of programs in its competitions. The National selection will go from 12 to 10 programs, and the International from 14 to 12. The second-largest French film festival, in terms of number of spectators  + 

ART VS LIMITLESS’ MONEY, SEX & POWER… WHO’D WIN?

CINEMA / ECONOMICS / FINANCE / SOCIETY / REVIEWS / 2023-09-18

Fascinating how the film “Limitless” by Neil Burger starring Bradley Cooper paints a dreamy picture of a struggling artist with an external solution to everything — a pill, stolen by the artist — to be used by the artist to pursue: 1) money 2) sex 3) power… and his art?  + 

IF ALEXEI MEDVEDEV REACTIVATES THEIR ACCOUNT, YOU’LL STILL BE FRIENDS

CINEMA / POLITICS / SOCIAL MEDIA / OUTSIDE NEWS / 2023-08-19

When I saw a “person missing” announcement in my Facebook feed, I somehow didn’t quite understand… “What’s going on? How so?” The usual, the so commonly trivial was going on — the death of an interesting person who did so much for Russian culture.  + 

SAM ALTMAN – EVERYBODY THOUGHT: FIRST AI WOULD DO PHYSICAL LABOR

ART THEORY / COMPUTERS / MUSIC / SOCIETY / ESSAYS / 2023-06-04

Everybody thought: first AI would do physical labor, then some cognitive labor, then the really hard cognitive labor, like programming… And then, last of all, but maybe never, because it’s magical and human… was creativity  + 

ИСКУССТВО КИНО – THE LAST ISSUE TO PRINT

CINEMA / JOURNALISM / ESSAYS / OUTSIDE NEWS / 2023-05-24

Искусство Кино — published since 1931 and thus, together with “Sight & Sound” and “Cahiers du Cinéma” one of the earliest magazines to cover the film industry, art and theory — has printed its last issue. Yes, my work has been featured in it. But  + 

“FOR ALL MANKIND” SEASON 1

CINEMA / REVIEWS / 2022-07-12

Finally got to watch “For All Mankind” season 1… well, Ronald Moore sure is consistent with his regular soap opera vibe. Or rather, alcohol+tobacco opera — the amount of drinking and smoking easily surpasses the amount of RP-1 burning and space flying. It ticks all  + 

SPECIAL OPERATIONS

CINEMA / POLITICS / SOCIETY / ESSAYS / 2022-03-01

You know what’s “special” about “an operation”? It’s when it CREATES something new. A piece of art: a film, a book, a soundtrack. A scientific discovery. A technological breakthrough. A medical procedure that allows us to walk hours after appendectomy. A business that transforms us  + 

PERSIST AND DO THE WORK… OR GO BACK TO MISSOURI

ART THEORY / CINEMA / LITERATURE / OUTSIDE NEWS / 2021-03-23

“When things get tough with that rewrite, and you’re starting to see this whole dream fall apart… who are the ones that actually stay in for the long haul? Often it’s narcissists. Often it’s people with big egos. It’s people who really think they’re interesting.  + 

CAUSES CHANGE. CULTURES REMAIN.

CINEMA / POLITICS / ESSAYS / 2020-04-21

Thanks to HBO’s Chernobyl, fewer people worldwide will rejoice at the officially low stats of Covid-19 deaths in Russia. Causes change. Cultures remain.  + 

STUCK IN THE MIDDLE AGES?

CINEMA / SOCIETY / ESSAYS / 2020-02-17

Judging by the popularity of movie / series franchises, humanity is stuck in the middle ages. Swords, magic, religious sects… Marvel’s super-heroes with gems, hammers, bows and arrows; Star Wars / Mandalorian; Harry Potter; Game of Thrones; The Witcher; Lord of the Rings. The futuresque  + 

DEATH ON SCREEN

CINEMA / PSYCHOLOGY / SOCIETY / ESSAYS / 2019-11-29

We view death countless times on screens, daily. People exploding, shot, bleeding-out, run-over, cut to pieces in so many “creative” ways. And yet, how many of us think about the inescapable fact that at some point in the future, possibly very near future, we’ll be  + 

ART IS NOT DEFINED BY ITS MODE OF CONSUMPTION

ART THEORY / CINEMA / PAINTING / ESSAYS / 2019-08-31

People who claim that an art form is defined by its consumption method continue to amaze (aggravate?) me. According to them, next time you buy a painting to hang on your wall, remember that outside the museum, it won’t be a piece of art anymore.  + 

CHERNOBYL? BECAUSE IT’S CHEAPER.

CINEMA / ECONOMICS / ENVIRONMENT / REVIEWS / 2019-06-11

“The emergency shutdown system at Chernobyl had a fatal flaw. At 01:23:40, Akimov engages AZ-5, or SCRAM. The fully withdrawn control rods begin moving back into the reactor. These rods are made of boron, which reduces reactivity… but not the tips. The tips are made  + 

MONEY = ENERGY… FOLLOW THE MONEY TO GET TO THE ENERGY

ART THEORY / CINEMA / ECONOMICS / PHYSICS / ESSAYS / 2019-01-29

Energy is what constitutes and organizes matter (and antimatter ? ). Prana is an Earth-local, Vedic special interpretation of it. Money is an Earth-local, economic interpretation of it. Follow the money and you’ll follow the energy that constitutes and organizes matter. If you really want  + 

NO ONE WILL REMEMBER YOU BEING LATE

CINEMA / FINANCE / INDUSTRIAL DESIGN / ESSAYS / 2018-12-05

Nobody will remember if your film / book / design was late and over-budget… But everyone will remember if it was bad. Finance for the long term. Yeah, despite the capitalist preference for the short-term quarterly reports. ? Harder? Sure. But worth it in the  + 

FILM MARKET IMBALANCE

CINEMA / ECONOMICS / ESSAYS / 2018-07-10

Speaking of film market imbalance… The 2018 Cannes film festival and market has seen 12 411 participants from 114 countries, of which: 980 — festival programmers 1 743 — buyers 3 858 — producers  + 

“LETO” REVIEW

CINEMA / REVIEWS / 2018-06-06

Saw the premiere in Cannes… A rather weird alternative rendition of an (imagined?) fleeting romance of legendary Russian pop-rock singer Viktor Tsoi in the 1980s Saint Petersburg. Hipsterish B&W, “It Never Happened” announcements, 4th wall pokes, awkward handwriting notes on the screen… I much prefer  + 

MOST CINEMAS STRUGGLE TO MEET PROJECTION STANDARDS

CINEMA / ESSAYS / 2018-06-01

Projection quality in most cinemas today is, alas, quite bad. If you think seeing a movie on a “big screen” is “the best cinematic experience”… well, sorry to disappoint you. On average, what you see in theaters worldwide, including in supposedly top-notch multiplexes in world  + 

“LA PRIÈRE / THE PRAYER” REVIEW

CINEMA / REVIEWS / 2018-03-23

La Prière / The prayer at the Berlin Film Festival is a classically, solidly, well-told story about a French heroin addict who joins a Christian Catholic community of former addicts who live isolated in the Alps mountains and use manual work and prayer as a  + 

“DOVLATOV” REVIEW

CINEMA / LITERATURE / REVIEWS / 2018-03-20

A premiere of “Dovlatov” film at the Berlin Film Festival. 6 days in the 70s life of a Soviet writer Sergei Dovlatov – Сергей Довлатов, an unknown to almost anyone in the USSR until it fell in 1991. And still largely unknown globally. Unfortunately, not  + 

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