QUAD-o-RAMA: Monster On The Campus (1958)

Absorb the essence of this neglected film in less than 8 minutes !!

Quad-O-Rama™:  In order to match the cacophonous assault of today’s films, older films can be truncated (all the boring parts are deleted), and then cut in to 4 equal sections to be displayed simultaneously.  Hence, a standard length film can be displayed in 10 minutes or less, but still retain coherence to the original.

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Hot town, summer in the City…

Released by the Lovin’ Spoonful in the summer of 1966 (a lifetime ago!), Summer in the City remains etched in my youthful memory.  Who can forget lyrics like “Back of my neck getting dirty and gritty…” clearly sung by John Sebastian?  I know I can’t.  Did you know that Joe Cocker covered the song in the 1990s?  Neither did I.

crossing the Richmond – San Rafael Bridge

May 23, 2019:  shot in time-lapse mode on my iPhone, crossing into Marin County, after sunset, on the Richmond-San Rafael Bridge.   The bridge opened in 1956, but has always been overshadowed by its more famous neighbors:  the Bay Bridge and the Golden Gate Bridge.

Cuarón, Roma (trailer), Pink Floyd

This is a beautiful film, gorgeously photographed in black & white, casual and breathtaking at the same time, impeccably choreographed, alive with the mystery that is life.  Yeah, I really liked it.  Best to see it on the big screen.  This trailer just appeared to remind me of the films transcendent greatness.  The Pink Floyd music (not used in the actual film) really sells it.

Igor Stravinsky – The Rite of Spring (just the music)

19630000d DLB 8th gradeNostalgia department:  in 1963, my Mother & Step-Father took me to the Dayton (Ohio) Philharmonic Orchestra (on a school night!), my first experience with live classical music.  I distinctly remember the part where the musicians “tuned up” their instruments, thinking that was part of the work which was subsequently performed:  Igor Stravinsky’s  Le Sacre du Printemps (The Rite of Spring).  It was to be my introduction to “classical” music and it was memorable.  Of course, I knew nothing of its history, that it was a riot causing sensation when it premiered (as a ballet) 50 years before in Paris, that it was to become one of the most monumental and influential musical works of the 20th Century, I just thought all classical music must be AWESOME!  Two takes on the work:

Leonard Bernstein & the New York Philharmonic Orchestra (probably from the 1960s), a treat to watch Bernstein conduct:

And, interestingly, Stravinsky wrote a version for piano (2 performers, 4 hands, 1 piano) which was published about a year before the Orchestral/Ballet version (one can only imagine what it was like to hear Stravinsky and Claude Debussy performing it to an unsuspecting audience in 1912).  Here is a stunning performance by Dutch Brothers Lucas & Arthur Jussen: