Back in the game

I am almost 3 months in Czech, left Geneve behind with memories remaining. 3 months in the Town of Telc, swimming in booze, flying high and spending all my earnings away so fast. That is the reason of no fresh posts over here. All this funny shit is beeing capped so far by yesterday's High School Reunion Party.

Very pleasant and friendly meeting 10 years after leaving exam. It is great to see that all the people I spent my teenage with in one classroom are doing so great, spread to all imaginable kinds of businesses, services, whatever, proud parrents, succesfully and happy. I am proud of you guys, gud luck 2 yall in your next days. Looking forward to next reunion. :)

Quads

Delicatessen (Jean-Pierre Jeunet, Marc Caro / 1991)

Was that funny? Or not? I do not know, as I do not know wheather I like it or not.
3/5

Neither poster nor cover
Postava k podpirani (Jan Schmidt, Pavel Juráček / 1963)

Maybe it is best attempt of Kafka's atmosphere in film. Variration to The Process. Problem is that I consoder acting and behaving of the main character in this book totaly retarded. Comunist circumstances in this movie make it little more beliavable. I'm really surprised that there could be made this movie in that time. But I made it to the end only cause it was so short.
1/5

Intimni osvetleni (Ivan Passer / 1965)

Wonderful paint of the most ordinary life. Just feelings of the atmosphere. I do not like New Wave films a lot, but this exception proves the rule. Fifth point goes for the beauty of Vera Kresadlova and lovely and charming spontaneity of her character Stepa.
5/5

Paris, Texas (Wim Wenders / 1984)

Strong, slowly told story. My relationship to this film went the same way like the relationship of the son to his recovered father - surprise, expectation, dislike, finding and love. So emotive end after all that finding, meeting in the cabin and finding very themselves. Tears during last scene!
4/5

Trips

Wholetrain (Florian Gaag / 2006)
CZ dubbed

Movie about life of graffiti writers. Struggle between 2 crews and against law. Quite reliable I guess. I did not like their styles too much. :)
3/5

Donnie Darko (Richard Kelly / 2001)
Director's Cut, 2004

=-o WTF?!? Richard Kelly a) uses placebo to cure his sick mind, b) uses brutal strong mushrooms c) watches films by David Lynch too much d) a+b+c all together. This is so extraordinary film that I do not know wheather it is plus or not. I did not understand at all (I do not understand a lot of things in films by Lynch, but I like it in spite of it. Here I am completely unsure about anything :)
Btw. Correct answer is d) or p) or x).
?/5

Deal (Gil Cates Jr. / 2008)

Very good begin till the moment Alex leaves Tony. Than the story goes more and more predictable and in final scene I was pretty sure that Alex was folding best hand right at the moment he was throwing it into the muck. (I thought he had Ladies, but Rockets are more impressive of course) Shannon Elisabeth is pretty nice hooker (But Elisabeth Shue still rulez)
2/5

Building post

There is a huge discussion about design of The New National Library of the Czech Republic made by Future Systems, a studio of Jan Kaplicky, czech native architect living in London. This design won a competition but divided czech nation to Love-It and Hate-It halves. One say that it looks like terrible space spit being too agressive to Prague's look. The other say that it is beautiful and top modern architecture and if you did not like it you are conservative type livining back in the days.

How is my sick view? I love modern architecture and hate this design. :) I've been checking all designs made by Future Systems and it's simply not my cup of tea. There are only few of them I like - The Earth Centre, House in Wales, Naples subway and other few I find quite interesting - Hauer King House, Maserati Museum. But most of them look so artificial to me.

Btw. It is not a space spit, fools. It is Fry's meal of course. :D

In contrary of Kaplicky I love designs by Frank Gehry. This guy is an artist who makes huge sculptures in which people are living, working and having fun.

Sketches of Frank Gehry (Sydney Polack / 2005)

Very nice documentary by well known director who is not niether documentarist nor architect about well known guy who sculptures buildings.
4/5

Portishead - Third

There is still more than month to release date of Portishead new album and it is all over the internet allready. I was afraid a lot of this album - it is first studio LP after 10 years and almost no live performances and I was not sure wheather this reunion is not made for money only. But I have to say that there is no need to be scared. It is still the old good Portishead, but not the same - which is great. There is a progress, live instruments are making the music more complex. It seems as very natural next step after first 2 albums of electronic trip-hop and then played along with an orchestra. I've heard the album only once so far, but I'm sure that I'm gonna buy it (as well as I did all previous Portishead LPs).
Btw. This is very subjective opinoin, cause I'm huge fan of this group. :)

Portishead [2008] Third
comes April 28 (UK) and April 29 (U.S.)

01 Silence
02 Hunter
03 Nylon Smile
04 The Rip
05 Plastic
06 We Carry On
07 Deep Water
08 Machine Gun
09 Small
10 Magic Doors
11 Threads

Not a gangsta lover

Once Upon A Time In America (Sergio Leone / 1984)
Director's Cut, CZ dubbed

I am not an expert in gangster movies (I've seen Bugsy and Bronx Tale so far), but this one was so boooring that I had to try really hard to watch till the end (almost 4 hours!). I don't mind of slow flow and long shots, but there has to be something what makes you enjoying/forgotting it. I did not find anything like this in this one.
2/5

Goodfellas (Martin Scorsese / 1990)

Expecting too much (again), getting much less. I find the end (drug addict and joining the Victim Witness Program for saving life) much more interesting than the rest of film. It seems ganster movie are not my cup of tea. I have to see if The Godfather is so unique being #1 on imdb.com TOP 250.
3/5

There were 2 more films I had been watching but did not held up till the end - Scarface (Howard Hawks, Richard Rosson / 1932) and Who's The Man? (Ted Demme / 1993).

Puzzle almost finished

The day I started this blog last big piece of our huge puzzle went down. Hopefully all the cables connecting all pieces togheter are gonna work properly :) It is so courageous to let a sickminded primitive do such kind of work :D But I'm pretty sure it's better than "italian job". If it is courageous to let me do cabeling, then it is suicide to let Italians. Have anyone ever told them that wires are not spaghetti? :D

Toxique

After pretty long time I've heard Czech LP which I really like. There are not many projects to be comparable to rest of the world. I mean that it can be played on any radio and listeners will not say: WTF?!? :) I confess that I do not check CZ scene very much so maybe there are other good guys, but not in radio playable music. I have not heard anything such good except Jan Muchow's projects, The Ecstasy Of Saint Theresa especially.
It's not toxique waste. It's just Toxique.

Toxique [2008] Toxique

01 Soul & Shine
02 Two Sides
03 Be Good
04 Honey
05 Clap Trap
06 My Dear
07 The Right Man
08 Remember
09 Naked Sculpture
10 Telephone
11 Bad Feelin‘
12 Count Ten
13 F*Business
14 So Into You
15 Story
16 Way
17 Bonus: Two Sides (radio edit)

Take it easy guys

It is nice when one likes his/her work, but do not forget - work is not everything. So do not stretch it too much and enjoy your lifes a little at least. It is always bad when someone notices your existence (?) as lately as you start to stink. :D

THX God It's Friday

Classic YP motto comes true after a week again and lil hint for me (it is more evident when written) - don't go to work tomorrow asshole :D Incoming weekend is in token of struggle. Housecleaning and laundering vs. nice cars. Plus I have to cook some meal to avoid meat becoming stinky as last time :) Shit. Rhyme for this weekend:

Life is hard, life is a struggle
no one wants to finish in bubble.

(To finish in bubble in poker tournament means to finish in the first not-paid place. F.e. if first 30 places were paid, the bubble is place #31. It is similar as 4th place in sports where gold, silver and bronze medals are awarded - In Czech this is called "potato medal"))