July is off to a hot and stormy beginning, though June was no slouch, either. We finished the old month with 4 days above 90 F, topping out at 96 F on the 30th. There were also 3 days at 88 F and 1 day at 89 F. We also had a storm that month that knocked out our power for around 4 hours. Then comes July. The first 3 days had highs of 99 F, 98 F, and 96 F. After our 5-day heat wave ended came the big wind. Friday's storm hit us around 6:30 pm with 113 km wind gusts. The wind lasted around 40 minutes, creating havoc in our county and beyond. Our power returned at 3:15 am, 8 3/4 hours after it went off. There are people (thousands of them) who won't have their power back on until Monday night (3 days after the storm). Many in Ontario are also still waiting, some of them living very close to us. We made out fine, though it was an uncomfortable evening and night. We lost many small branches, and we will head outside to clean up soon. Rain finally hit us around 3:30 am, and it really came down, nearly an inch. More bad storms are predicted for today and tomorrow.
Continuing with local news, last Monday was the full moon and I finally began the Mahler Project, listening to all of the symphonies and extracting what truths are available to my somewhat less than all-encompassing mind. The Mahler 1st is possibly the best symphony ever written that illustrates exactly what it means to be human. It is set in the Alps, and the opening describes a sunrise in the mountains, followed by an eventful day of wandering and wondering. The fourth movement not only has a great description of oncoming evening, but the loud and boisterous events that precede it are eventually calmed down, and we actually hear breathing that becomes slower and slower until sleep finally comes. Of course the work concludes in a big way, a big bang of sorts, seeming to glorify the mountains and our ability to fully appreciate landscape and nature. So if you want a truly human experience and can't get to the mountains easily (we live in the flattest county in Ontario), try the Mahler 1st. Repeated listening enhances each and every experience described. We listened to the Detroit Symphony version directed by Jader Bignamini, from the DSO Listen Again website. I doubt if a better version exists.
Afterwards, my mind ablaze and glowing, I came up with a weird way of describing infinity. Imagine that there is a person (we will call him Mapman Mike) and someone does a thorough biography of his life. And I mean thorough. It deals, among other things, with all the people that Mapman has met and interacted with. So now imagine that a person reads this biography and comes across a person, Claude we shall say, that Mapman once knew and interacted with. She finds Claude fascinating, and does a biography about him and the people he has met. Of course there is a small overlap, since Mapman and Claude both knew a few of the same people. But now the cast of characters has expanded a lot. Now someone reads Claude's biography and comes across an interesting person by the name of Clarissa (not known by Mapman). And so on. My question is, if this research were to continue, would it eventually include everyone, alive or dead, who ever existed? Would it take us back as far as the dawn of humans (assuming that research could be carried out well into prehistoric times). Would Mapman have some kind of connection with one of the Lascaux painters, say? Are all Homo Sapiens connected somehow? Of course we are. And it makes my brain hurt to think about it.
In viewing news (on our 55" TV) we watched Series 4 of Dark Winds, a series based very loosely on the books by Tony Hillerman about Navajo police detective Joe Leaphorn. This was the worst season so far, and some of them have been pretty bad. Based on Hillerman's The Ghostway, the book deals not only with crime but with Navajo traditions and beliefs as well. American TV detective shows are almost all the same--the criminal can do anything at will until the final few moments of the finale. Then the good guy gets the upper hand (at last). Stretching out a novel for 8 episodes might work if the novel was a long and involved one. But Hillerman's books could easily be handled in 2 hours instead of over 6. To extend the story the writers have to make the police into complete idiots and the bad guy (girl in this case) into some kind of genius. Watching a trained police lieutenant take out the bad girl, then run away when she is down instead of taking her weapon and securing her first just makes no sense. Any cop watching this show would be laughing out loud at the ineptness shown by the good guys. There are several other similar examples from this truly terrible rendering of Hillerman's story, but they become too painful to relate.
they are more like Keystone cops.
There are three movies to lightly review, and we began watching Season Two of Professor T. Working from most recent film watched, The Haunted Castle is from 1921 and directed by F W Murnau, one year before he undertook Nosferatu. This one is a murder/mystery, with the accused taking things into his own hands to prove his innocence and bring the guilty party to light. While far from being a great film, or even a somewhat good one, it is fully restored and its wonderful to see a film more than 100 years old looking like it was developed last week. Full marks to the film restoration groups that continue to save forgotten and nearly destroyed old movies.
Speaking of restoring 1920s films, we watched Return to Reason, four short films by Man Ray. Featuring some amazing visual art through a camera lens, here is the Criterion blurb for the film, which was released in 2023.
"The swirling surrealist dreams of Man Ray are high-water marks of 1920s
avant-garde cinema, a nexus of cryptic themes, dark eroticism, and
playful abstraction. Seemingly plucked from an unconscious realm, these
four shorts—LE RETOUR À LA RAISON, EMAK BAKIA, L’ÉTOILE DE MER, and LES
MYSTÈRES DU CHÂTEAU DU DÉ—find the visionary artist experimenting with
the limitless possibilities of montage, superimposition, distortion, and
even the application of objects directly onto celluloid. Set here to an
ethereal score by the Jim Jarmusch–Carter Logan collaboration SQÜRL,
these cine-poems are optical carnival rides that surprise, delight, and
unsettle with each tantalizing frame."
At times the films are hard to watch, flashing between dark screen images and brilliant white ones. I had to squint hard a lot of the time. The accompanying music, mentioned above, really added to the viewing. Again kudos to the restoring team, and to Jarmusch and Logan.
One of the best films we have seen in a long time is The Conformist, a Bertolucci film from 1971. This was our 2nd viewing, but it had been a very long time. The story is about a worm of a man who is sent to France by the Italian fascists to kill a professor there fighting against their cause. Too cowardly to kill in the end, he sits in the car and watches it all happen instead, including to a beautiful woman (the professor's young wife) with whom he is in love. At the end of the film, when Fascism has been routed from Italy, he runs around accusing friends of being Fascist, saying that they should be arrested. This is a totally brilliant film, one of the most damning ever made of a certain type of human being. There are many memorable scenes, including the Parisian cafe dance of the two women, and then of course the prolonged double murder scene in the chilly mountains. Unforgettable masterpiece of a film,and very highly recommended.
Mapman Mike
