My week with Marilyn

I have been making some graphics with my lovely GIMP programme lately, and I must say I'm proud of how I'm slowly starting to get better and better. Tonight, I wanted to practise some more and found this random Marilyn Monroe picture on Google. I do admit it's not the most complicated graphic I've ever seen or that you have probably ever seen, but the result satisfies me.

Whilst working on this picture with the flashing Marilyn in it, I came to think of a new Marilyn movie that came out recently: My week with Marilyn. It hasn't been released here yet, so I haven't seen it, and therefore I also can't say too much about it for now, but this one is certainly on my must-see list! The trailer looks so promising! 

Judge for yourselves:

The rating of this movie on IMDb is four stars out of five, so I don't think this movie will disappoint me. I love the clothing and the ambiance in the trailer!

And look at this wonderful movie pictures:

Has anyone already seen this one?

Goodbye Stasi!

I know it may sound a little odd, but I have this thing for history during the era in which half of Europe was ruled by communism. It's not like I have any sympathy for Stalin, on the contrary! It fascinates me how Europe could have been so divided and it makes even more impact when I think that it was only 22 years ago the Berlin Wall fell.
Yes, I admit it's especially Germany's position I'm interested in. Unlike many other students, German was one of my favourite subjects at highschool and German grammar has the same impact on me as solving a sudoku. I also have this weak spot for Kafka; who is not German, I know, but he wrote in German and that's what counts for now. But what caught my interest the most, is how one of the most powerful countries of Europe could turn into two countries, controlled by other states.
This Summer, I was in Berlin for the first time and it surely had an impact on me. Seeing how the wall cut Berlin literally in half was so strange; it just felt somewhat surreal, even though I knew it was true.

Remains of a divided Berlin

Everything I saw, reminded me of the movie Goodbye Lenin, that tells the story of Alexander, who is an adolescent at the time the wall falls, but has to pretend the wall is still there every time he's near his mother, because she had been in a coma and wasn't allowed to get shocked by anything because of that. Such a wonderful movie, that's incredibly funny, yet tragical.



The typical humourof Goodbye Lenin

The atmosphere throughout the whole movie is wonderful, and not in the last place because of the music of the wonderful Yann Tiersen, whose piano pieces are stuck in the heads of every fan of the European film industry.
I even like this movie better than the very tragical movie Das Leben der Anderen. That movie shows us how a Stasi agent spies on a writer and his wife and knows and reports everything they say and do. In the DDR, everyone could be your enemy and you always had to be careful with what you said and what you did.


The trailer of Das Leben der Anderen

This is surely is a good movie too, and if you are more into dramatical movies than into comedies, you should absolutely watch this one. I just know that I like Goodbye Lenin more, because of its humour, and German humour is my absolute favourite humour in the world. (But I love British humour too.)

Have you ever seen either of them?

The Notorious Bettie Page

Do you know Bettie Page?



She was the most famous (or should we rather say infamous?) pin up model from the 1950s.
Bettie Mae Page was born in the Nashville, Tenessee on April 22, 1923. Her parents had three sons and three daughters and the family was very poor; they would divorce when Bettie was 10 years old. Her father molested all three of his daughters and ended up in jail after stealing a police car.
At high school, Bettie was a very good student and had roles in many of the school plays. After graduating, she left Tenessee for New York, where her career as a pinup model took off, when an amateur photographer asked her to pose, while she was on a break from her job as a secretary. She got more and more popular, resulting in being the centerfold of Playboy magazine in January 1955.


A picture of Bettie taken by Irvin Klaw

From 1951 onwards, she started posing for the photographer Irving Klaw, a photographer who specialized in S&M, and Bettie became known as the Queen of Bondage. Irving took thousands of pictures of Bettie; and Bettie also appeared in more than 50 burlesque films, Teaserama being the most famous one.
Back in the days, however, the prudish American society did not allow pictures like Klaw's and he was arrested for "conspiracy to distribute obscene material". Bettie was not arrested, but was asked to testify in the case and the senator of Tennessee launched a congressional investigation against her.


Bettie in Teaserama

After the cause with Klaw, Bettie retreated from public view and moved to Florida in 1957. Before the start of her career, she had been married and divorced and in the years after her career, the same scenario happened twice again.
The salvation of her misery was in 1959, when she saw a church with a neon cross on top and entered this building. This was the moment that would change Bettie's life forever, since it made her dedicate her life to Jesus Christ.
Quite an unexpected move from someone who used to be a pin up and S&M model, isn't it? Bettie had always been a christian, though. The reason why she had no problems with being portrayed (partially) nude, was because Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden were nude too.
Ever since the end of the 1950s, Bettie hasn't appeared in the public view anymore and led a rather quiet life, with the exception of being treated for schizophrenia for 8 years throughout the 1980s. Bettie died in December 2008, at the age of 85.


Bettie competing against a gorilla

Bettie had been practically forgotten until her pictures and movies were rediscovered by a large audience during the 1990s. People were fascinated by this woman, who seemed to be the innocent girl next door gone wild - a superstar whose success was demolished by the government and who practically disappeared afterwards.
This must have been the reason for director Mary Harron to film Bettie's past, her career and the way she vanished from the public view. The movie she made is named The Notorious Bettie Page and features Gretchen Mol as Bettie.


The trailer of The Notorious Bettie Page

I personally really enjoyed this movie. The ambiance is wonderful, the acting is good and the funniest part is that it shows how incredibly innocent the photo shoots actually were compared to what we are used to today. Bettie also did it purely because she enjoyed it, but didn't think of the possible consequences and the fact that it was not as innocent as she thought it was.
The real Bettie Page was positive about the movie too, but wasn't very pleased with the title of the movie.
"Notorious? That's not flattering at all. They should have used another word."



Bettie just did what she loved to do, that was all.
"I was not trying to be shocking, or to be a pioneer. I wasn't trying to change society, or to be ahead of my time. I didn't think of myself as liberated, and I don't believe that I did anything important. I was just myself. I didn't know any other way to be, or any other way to live."

Breakfast On Pluto

Breakfast On Pluto is a movie, set in the 1970s, that tells the story of Patrick: a young travestite living in a small village in Ireland. As a baby, he was abandoned by his mother, who moved to London to start a new life over there. Father Liam, the village's pastor, places the baby at a foster mother, but Patrick is not happy in his new family. When he grows up, he starts to dress more and more like a woman and he doesn't want to be called "Patrick" any longer, but "Kitten" or "Paddy" in stead.
In his late teens, Kitten gives up his life in Ireland and decides to go to London to find his mother. His two best friends, of which one, Irwin, has recently become a member of the IRA and his girlfriend, Chris, stay in Ireland.


Trailer

Kitten decides to hitchhike to London and ends up with an Indian Band on tour. The singer, Billy Hatchet and Kitten seem to fall in love with eachother, but neither the other band members, nor the audience approve this. Eventually, Kitten is installed in a trailer that belongs to Billy's mother and thinks it's wonderful, until he finds weapons that belong to the IRA in there.
Afterwards, Kitten returns to London in the hope he'll find his mother and a lot happens during his trip. He becomes the muse of a magician, a prostitute and gets accused of being a part of the IRA.

Cillian Murphy as Kitten

This movie is a real comedy drama. Kitten's life is not exactly a great and happy one, but you can't keep yourself from smiling and laughing when you see all his adventures. The film is very synoptic and is divided into chapters; just like a book.
I watched it during the night (it was broadcast on TV from 0.10AM to 2.17AM), but it didn't bore me at all and I had no hard time staying awake while watching.
The groovy 1970s vibe is wonderful and, even though the movie gets somewhat surreal at times, it seems very realistic.

I loved it and even though this movie isn't very well-known to a large audience, I certainly recommend it to everyone, especially those who like the 70s.

Lolita

Last winter, I finally read Vladimir Nabokov's master piece Lolita. Ever since I've heard of this book, I had been craving to read it. However, I didn't do that until I got the book from my mother in December.
I've been absolutely fascinated by Nabokov's style of writing, it's so refined. Humbert Humbert, the main character is a terrible man, but that's exactly what differentiates this book from any other story I had read so far.
Here's a small summary for those who are unfamiliar with the book:
The European Humbert Humbert moves to America in the 1950s. He moves in with the widow Charlotte and her 12 years old daughter Dolores "Lolita" Haze and falls immediately in love with the latter. Unable to show his love to her, he decides to marry her mother in order to be close to his Lolita. When Charlotte dies, Humbert takes his chance and starts touring the States with Dolores and is absolutely obsessed with her. However, it gets harder and harder to keep her under control.

Vladimir Nabokov

Back in 1955, when this book appeared, it was a huge scandal. The prudish society was in shock: how could a book like this be published? Paedophilia was not a topic that should be talked about and captivating it on paper was even worse. It was even banned in France, the U.K., Argentina, New Zealand and South Africa, because of it's sexual content.
Nabokov was not at all impressed by all the critisism. He translated his book to Russian - his native language and also wrote the screenplay for the movie (1962).
This movie isn't as controversial as the book was. It lacks the sexual tension between Humbert and Lolita. Probably because it still was a huge taboo and simply couldn't be shown on screen.
This typical black and white movie, including all clichés - such as dramatical music and passionate embraces - is actually rather entertaining.



Although this movie is two hours and twenty seven minutes long, you rush through the story. I'm not certain if anyone who doesn't know the book will be able to understand everything. A lot of details and parts of the original story were left out and only the most important details are shown. This is, of course, understandable: 2 hours and a half is long and by expanding that, it would be hard to keep the viewer interested.
The actors are wonderful and have all done a very well job. Peter Sellers was my favourite in this movie. His role isn't very big, but he certainly stole the show and his way of speaking was very amusing.
Peter Sellers was not the only one who added some wit to the movie. There were some enjoyable parts throughout the movie too. My favourite scene was the scene in which Humbert and one of the employees of the hotel where Lolita and Humbert would spend the night tried to unfold a camp bed. This doesn't work out as well as they were hoping for and they don't want to wake up Lolita. After a lot of effort, the bed is finally steady, but when Humbert wants to sleep on it, the bed crashes and Humbert has to sleep on a crashed camp bed, which is practically the same as on a mattress on the floor.

Sue Lyon as Lolita and James Mason as Humbert


This movie isn't the only filmed version of Nabokov's book. In 1997, another film appeared starring Jeremy Irons as Humbert Humbert. I haven't watched this version yet, but I'll certainly do so in the future.
Expect a review of that one too when I've seen it!