The point is not to direct someone, but to direct oneself. – Robert Bresson

1Killers of the Flower Moon was Robbie Robertson’s final soundtrack for director Martin Scorsese. The founding member, main composer and lead guitarist of the rock group, The Band, scored the film shortly before his death, and Scorsese dedicated the film to him. Killers of the Flower Moon closed with the Osage song, Wahzhazhe (A Song for My People), composed by Osage Nation Tribal Members, Scott George, Kenny Bighorse, and Vann Bighorse. Roberston felt that the music of the Osage is the best display of their extraordinary quest for survival. Robertson, who is both a tribal member of the Cayuga and Mohawk Nations and a Canadian of Jewish ancestry, was the music producer on over ten earlier Martin Scorsese films. Rest in peace, Robbie. You gave us the history of many forgotten artists, some dead and gone, and endowed us through your own songs and music in understanding the roots of rock and roll.

2 Paul Giamatti’s lazy eye in Alexander Payne’s The Holdovers was an artificial one, a blinding contact lense worn throughout the film. His portrayal of a despised classics teacher at a small New England boarding school with a distracting case of amblyopia, a type of poor vision that usually happens in just one eye, was intended to represent his low self-esteem, alienation and desire for solitude. Later, in the film, Giamatti’s teacher is instructed to chaperone the only student, an unruly one (breakout star, Dominic Sessa) left at the school during a lonely, snow-covered Christmas break. Neither are fond of one another, but eventually the lazy eye begins to illustrate the positive development of their relationship, when the student asks which eye he should look at when they are speaking, symbolizing a sign of respect between the two.

3 Past Lives is the directorial debut of South Korean-Canadian-American film director, playwright, and screenwriter, Celine Song. Song wrote the screenplay for Past Lives about two childhood friends with puppylove feelings for one another in Seoul, South Korea, who reunite 24 years later in New York. The reunion becomes complicated and soul searching when the now adult man realizes his former South Korean girlfriend has an American husband. Song based the film on her own life experiences when her South Korean family moved to Ontario, Canada when she was 12-years-old. Past Lives was selected as best picture of 2023 by The National Society of Film Critics.

4 After too long of an absence, Finland’s Aki Kaurismäki, returned to the cinema with Fallen Leaves, his 20th full-length film and a continuation of his Proletariat series. Highly influenced by Robert Bresson, Kaurismäki is best known for his minimalistic style, with an unblinking camera that seldom moves, rock and roll and characters without displays of emotion; who are usually left alone, facing tragedies and setbacks, yet never give up and eventually survive. Kaurismäki’s visual theme continues in Fallen Leaves, where a Helsinki single woman is fired from her zero-hour contract supermarket job for distributing expired food items still on the shelves to the poor. She meets an equally lonely and depressed manual laborer who is frequently fired for drinking on the job. Fallen Leaves is billed as a dramatic rom-com, but it’s important to note that it is a Finnish dramatic rom-com of the Kaurismäki kind.

5 In Menus-Plaisirs Les Troisgros, the patient camera of 93-year-old documentary film director, Frederick Wiseman, photographs a passionate debate between head chefs at a three Michelin stars French restaurant, a restaurant which has been run by the same family for four generations. It is an important debate, for it’s about the truth in the texture, color and depth of flavor in food. In another moment, an heir apparent son is emotionally shaken when his chef father changes a sauce which he’d spent three weeks creating. Later, Wiseman’s three-person documentary team visits a cold storage cave, and finds that each of the stored cheese has its own moment of truth.

6 The year 2023 proved to be a stellar one for German female actor, Sandra Hüller, where she appeared in two very different films, playing two very different characters. In The Zone of Interest, she was the wife of Nazi commandant Rudolf Höss, who lived with her family in a cottage and palatial grounds on the other side of the wall from the Auschwitz concentration camp; and in Anatomy of a Fall, another kind of wife, on trial for murdering her husband. Her body language in both is profound: In Zone, lumbering, almost vulgar, without any form of ambiguity; and in Anatomy, initially wounded, then strong, outraged and upright with conviction.

7 In Greek filmmaker Yorgos Lanthimos’ high-concept, absurdist black comedy, Poor Things, the narrative follows Bella Baxter (Emma Stone), a young woman in Victorian London who is reborn through a brain transplant and embarks on an odyssey of self-discovery. A veteran of Lanthimos’ 2018 film, The Favourite, Stone’s body language is nothing less than remarkable, where she whirls and twirls throughout the film, a combination of a ballerina and a contortionist. But the sound of her smoky voice required little acting; as an infant, Stone suffered from infantile colic – defined as episodes of crying for more than three hours a day, for more than three days a week, after three weeks in an otherwise healthy child – and consequently developed nodules and calluses on her vocal cords.

8 British Director Jonathan Glazer’s The Zone of Interest is his first feature film in ten years, following Under the Skin (2013), Birth (2004) and Sexy Beast (2000). Cautious, cerebal and always in control, Glazer is an auteur whose films are unmistakenly his own. In The Zone of Interest there are two different narratives, a dialectical collision of image and sound. Glazer leaves it to us to find meaning, and, in a sense, invites us to join him as the architect of the film. Film director, critic and theorist Jean-Luc Godard once commented about his own films: You listen to the images and watch the sound.

9 It was not necessary for director Todd Haines to reminds us in interviews that he was influenced by Ingmar Bergman’s Persona and Winter Light in making May December. The film’s visual design had explained that, but it was the literary content by screenwriter Samy Burch, about actress Elizabeth Berry (Natale Portman), researching a role about the still controversial Gracie Atherton-Yoo (Julianne Moore), which helped us understand Haines’ cinematic journey of grief, adultery and ambiguity, with few options for second changes. The narrative is based on the real life, Mary Kay Letourneau, who, at the age of 36, was sent to prison for having sex with 13-year-old Joe Yoo, later giving birth to their first child in confinement. In the film, after Joe, now an adult (in a landmark performance by Charles Melton) and actress Elizabeth have sexual intimacy, Joe abruptly leaves the room when she refers to his experiences as a story, replying that the story is his real life.

In the opening scene of Ira Sachs’ Passages, German actor Franz Rogowski plays Tomas, an egotistical film director who brazenly controls, frustrates and embarrasses an actor in front of the cast and crew, dictating, over and over again, how to play a simple scene. Later, in Tomas’ own personal life, he becomes frustrated and loses his own emotional control when his husband will not follow his directions on how they should live their life together, after informing him he had a rare sexual liaison with a woman, which evoked hidden feelings inside him. Tomas takes on Shakespearian proportions, filled with doubt, self-loathing and violence.

No doubt, I missed many key performances in 2023; so, T-Boy readers, feel free to send in your favorite list of the best films and performances of 2023, to Ed****@Tr**********.com

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• Pilgrimages and Sacred Destinations
• It’s Official: Trump Is Now Using Straight-up Nazi Talk
• Red Sea | Middle East, Marine Ecosystems & Geology
• Video shows “world’s most dangerous bird” emerging from ocean, stunning onlookers
• Woman recovering after she was bitten in the face by great white shark
• What You Need to Know about Thanksgiving in America
• 4 Ways Canadian Thanksgiving Differs From U.S.A.’s
• Hadrian’s Wall Damaged by Sycamore Gap Tree Felling, Inspection Confirms
• Fall Bounty in the Inland Northwest

Thanksgiving Day became a habit, for the reason that in the course of time, as the years drifted on, it was perceived that the exterminating had ceased to be mutual and was all on the white man’s side, consequently on the Lord’s side; hence it was proper to thank the Lord for it and extend the usual annual compliments.
– Autobiography of Mark Twain, Volume 1 (University of California Press, 2010)

The post Beatles and Other Things appeared first on Traveling Archive.

1. NYFF61 Festival Report
   
   The 61st New York Film Festival recently closed up shop, which means that it was once again time for Film Comment’s Festival Report, with our annual live overview of the NYFF that was. Devika and Clint convened an all-star team of critics: Molly Haskell, Adam Nayman, and Kelli Weston, for a spirited wrap-up analysis of the highlights and lowlights from the NYFF61 lineup. In front of a lively audience, the panel discussed and debated Todd Haynes’s May December, Ryûsuke Hamaguchi’s Evil Does Not Exist, Jonathan Glazer’s The Zone of Interest, Bradley Cooper’s Maestro, Bertrand Bonello’s The Beast, Sofia Coppola’s Priscilla, Yorgos Lanthimos’ Poor Things, and many other noteworthy selections.
   
    
   
   
   
   
2. Are the Palestinians Wrong about Everything? (An Average Israeli Perspective)
   
   
   
   
   
   
3. Online calculator can gauge stress level of air travel
   FlightsFinder has introduced an online Airport Stress Calculator to help travelers avoid hassles while flying or prepare for potentially difficult situations. Users can enter their departure time, airline and airport and the tool will analyze how busy the airport is likely to be, the chances of having a flight delay and airlines’ specific baggage restrictions.
   
   
   
   
4. Best Directorial Film Trilogies
   
   
   
   
5. Upcoming Book-to-Screen Adaptations
      
   • The Other Black Girl
     by Zakiya Dalila Harris
     Zakiya Dalila Harris’ 2021 mystery-thriller follows twentysomething publishing assistant Nella Rogers, who is tired of being the only Black employee in the office. So she’s delighted when Harlem native Hazel joins the team as another woman of color. But things get quickly and severely weird when a series of unsettling events turns Nella’s world upside down. The new Hulu series adaptation premiered in September, and the creative team cites some varied inspirations, from Nella Larsen’s 1929 novel Passing to Jordan Peele’s instant-classic 2017 horror film Get Out.
     
   • The Changeling
     by Victor LaValle
     Victor LaValle is one of the most innovative writers working in speculative fiction these days. (For immediate proof, check out his 2016 quick-read novella The Ballad of Black Tom.) LaValle’s 2017 novel The Changeling follows an antiquarian book dealer who travels through eldritch realms to save his family. LaValle’s book is a slow-motion collision of dark fantasy, gritty realism, and parental anxiety. The Apple TV+ adaptation, starring LaKeith Stanfield, premiered its first three episodes on September 8, with eight total planned for release through the fall season.
     
   • Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe
     by Benjamin Alire Sáenz
     Check the reader reviews and you’ll find that people have a deep and genuine affection for this 2021 coming-of-age YA novel. The story introduces two Mexican American teens living in 1980s Texas and explores themes of family, queerness, and ethnic identity. The big-screen adaptation, in theaters now, features up-and-coming actors Max Pelayo and Reese Gonzales as Aristotle and Dante, respectively. Also on board: Eva Langoria, as Dante’s artistic mom, and Lin-Manuel Miranda behind the scenes as producer.
     
   • Black Cake
     by Charmaine Wilkerson
     A Goodreads Choice Award nominee for both Best Historical Fiction and Best Debut, author Charmaine Wilkerson’s 2022 novel concerns two siblings, a strange bequeathment, and a famous Caribbean recipe with a loooooong history. Black Cake shuttles back and forth in time, as the siblings learn about their family’s astonishing past and how stories are passed down through generations. (Sometimes via cake recipe!) The TV series adaptation, from Oprah Winfrey’s Harpo Films, is set to debut on Hulu November 1.
     
   • Killers of the Flower Moon
     by David Grann
     Investigative journalist David Grann made all the best-of lists in 2017 with this book about a terrible and largely forgotten chapter in American history. In the 1920s, dozens and perhaps hundreds of Osage Native Americans were murdered in a vicious dispute over oil rights in Oklahoma. Probably the most high-profile adaptation of the year, director Martin Scorsese’s long-awaited film will debut in U.S. theaters on October 20, with an Apple TV+ release later in the year. The cast includes Leonardo DiCaprio, Robert De Niro, and Blackfeet Nation actress Lily Gladstone.
     
   • Lessons in Chemistry
     by Bonnie Garmus
     Another incoming AppleTV+ adaptation-premiering October 13-Lessons in Chemistry is based on author Bonnie Garmus’ warmly received debut novel from last year. The setup: Brilliant chemist Elizabeth Zott finds herself hosting America’s most popular cooking show, where she challenges 1960s notions of what a woman can do in her professional life. A genuine hit with both readers and critics, the book earned the attention of Hollywood A-lister Brie Larson (Captain Marvel!), who is fittingly both lead performer and executive producer. You really can have it all!
     
   • All the Light We Cannot See
     by Anthony Doerr
     Winner of the 2015 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction, Anthony Doerr’s World War II novel follows the parallel stories of a blind French girl and a reluctant German soldier whose lives come together in occupied France circa 1940. Netflix’s four-part limited series is set to drop on November 2, with all episodes available upon debut. This is prestige-picture territory for Netflix, and the production has attracted some top-shelf talent including Mark Ruffalo, Hugh Laurie, and newcomer Aria Mia Loberti, a legally blind actress who won the role after a global casting process.
     
   • The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes
     by Suzanne Collins
     Both spin-off and prequel, this 2020 dystopian sci-fi novel from Suzanne Collins marks her return to the colossal pop culture phenomenon that is the Hunger Games series. Set 64 years before the events of the first book, the novel provides an origin story for ultimate boss villain Coriolanus Snow. Is he the good guy in the new book? Is he the bad guy? The answer is yes. The movie adaptation, starring Tom Blyth as young man Snow, hits theaters November 17. Rachel Zegler plays Snow’s protégée, Lucy Gray Baird.
     
     
     
     
   • Leave the World Behind
     by Rumaan Alam
     Author Rumaan Alam’s popular 2020 novel fits squarely with a long and noble tradition in the psychological thriller genre: the Vacation Gone Wrong. Two families end up at the same luxurious Long Island rental property when word comes that a mysterious blackout has struck New York City. Then things get really weird. The star-studded film adaptation-featuring Julia Roberts, Mahershala Ali, Ethan Hawke, Myha’la Herrold, and Kevin Bacon-is slated to premiere December 8 on Netflix, with a limited theatrical release likely as well.
     
   • Eileen
     by OttessaMoshfegh
     The first full novel from author Ottessa Moshfegh, Eileen was a surprise sensation in 2015, winning the Hemingway Foundation/PEN Award for debut fiction. Genre designations are terminally blurred with this one, and that’s part of the book’s strange, dark appeal. The story-one fateful week in the life of two women in 1960s Boston-is a kind of literary thriller, inspired by Shirley Jackson, Vladimir Nabokov, and the films of Alfred Hitchcock. Anne Hathaway and New Zealand actress Thomasin McKenzie headline the movie adaptation, coming to theaters December 1.
     
   • Foe
     by Iain Reid
     Canadian author Iain Reid specializes in the shadowy areas between cerebral horror, haunting sci-fi, and psychological thriller. In his sophomore novel, Foe, a near-future marriage is tested when the husband is replaced by his biomechanical double. While technically science fiction, the story is much more interested in the people involved than in the technology. The film adaptation, starring Saoirse Ronan and Paul Mescal, will debut in theaters on October 6, with a later streaming debut on Amazon Prime.
     
     
     
     
6. The T-Boy Society of Film & Music’s Top Five North-American-English Language Travel Novels
   
   
   
   
7. Florida lawmaker who penned “Don’t Say Gay” law sentenced to prison
   Joseph Harding, a former Florida lawmaker who penned the state’s controversial “Don’t Say Gay” law has been sentenced to prison for wire fraud, money laundering and making false statements in connection with obtaining $150,000 in COVID-19 relief loans.
   
   
   1. What Really is Halloween
   • Halloween or Hallowe’en (less commonly known as Allhalloween, All Hallows’ Eve, or All Saints’ Eve) is a celebration observed in many countries on October 31, the eve of the Western Christian feast of All Saints’ Day. It begins the observance of Allhallowtide, the time in the liturgical year dedicated to remembering the dead, including saints (hallows), martyrs, and all the faithful departed.
     
     One theory holds that many Halloween traditions were influenced by Celtic harvest festivals, particularly the Gaelic festival Samhain, which are believed to have pagan roots. Some go further and suggest that Samhain may have been Christianized as All Hallow’s Day, along with its eve, by the early Church.Other academics believe Halloween began solely as a Christian holiday, being the vigil of All Hallow’s Day. Celebrated in Ireland and Scotland for centuries, Irish and Scottish immigrants took many Halloween customs to North America in the 19th century, and then through American influence various Halloween customs spread to other countries by the late 20th and early 21st century.
     
     
     
     
     
8. T-Boy Society of Film and Music’s Favorite Food Destination Cities
   
   
   
   
9. ‘Every single day I am ready to be killed’: The KGB defector who writes about Putin
   
   
   
   

The post NY Film Festival, Halloween, Books to Film appeared first on Traveling Archive.

• 7 Essential Movies From French Filmmaking Legend Robert Bresson (Collider)
• Revealed: The greatest country on Earth (according to you) (The Telegraph)
• A cruise line’s arrival at the Faroe Islands in the North Atlantic coincided with the local tradition of slaughtering pilot whales, shocking passengers. (The Messenger)
• One in seven motorists say anxiety affects their driving (Avia.com)
• Finn: Name Meaning, Popularity and Info (BabyNames.com)
• World’s Best Vineyards 2023: Top 50 (Youtube.com)
• 10 Years Ago: George Zimmerman is found not guilty of killing Trayvon Martin (NYmag.com)
• Guess Which Word Each U.S. State Looked Up More Than Any Other (Dictionary.com)
• Why Was a Book about Anne Frank Banned in Florida? (katiecouric.com)
• Booze, black-tie balls and a hell of a lot of sex – the secrets of Army life (telegraph.co.uk)

The post Summer: Driving, Cruising, Vineyards & Banned Books appeared first on Traveling Archive.

1 Anne Frank’s Childhood Friend Recalls Their Years Before the Holocaust – Smithsonian Magazine

2 Will AI destroy the music industry? – theweek.com

3 Guide to the Scottish Highlights – tripsavvy.com

4 FDR’S First Fireside Chat: March 12, 1933 – Miller Center

5 How Native Hawaiians Have Fought for Sovereignty – history.com

6 Common Causes of Foot Pain – verywellhealth.com

7 The Jewish Refugees Who Fled Nazi Germany—Then Returned to Fight – history.com

8 Costa Rica Wildlife – Meet the Red Brocket Deer – ticotimes.net

9 Movement and Nature’s Patterns of Leadership – kathleenallen.net

10 The 10 Best Films of 1971 – Traveling Boy

“If you want to make a documentary you should automatically go to the fiction, and if you want to nourish your fiction you have to come back to reality.” – Jean-Luc Godard

The post Spring: History, Health, Film & Wildlife appeared first on Traveling Archive.

• We asked AI to interview Marilyn Monroe 61 years after her death and this is how it went
• Did Neanderthals Collect Impressive Animal Skulls?
• Stasher Reveals the World’s Best & Worst Tourist Attractions
• 30 Life Lessons Learned in 30 Years
• AI Narratives: A History of Imaginative Thinking About Intelligent Machines
• How to visit the locations in David Attenborough’s new Wild Isles series
• Audubon Society board votes to keep name despite slavery ties
• Barbie Through the Ages
• The Decline of Strict Etiquette
• Traveling Boy Selects the 75 Greatest Film Directors of All-Time – Traveling Boy

If it’s a good movie, the sound could go off and the audience would still have a perfectly clear idea of what was going on.

– Alfred Hitchcock

The post From Neanderthals & Barbie to AI & Etiquette appeared first on Traveling Archive.

• How Busy Will 2023 Spring Break Travel Season Be? – TravelPulse
• Happy St. Patrick’s Day Recipes – Traveling Boy
• California leads US states in UFO sightings, research says – PressDemocrat
• Berlin’s new cultural heart – Visit Berlin
• Quilt Barns: A Quaint and Colorful Tour Through Oregon History – Traveling Boy
• BVI Sailing School – Come Live Your Sailing Dreams
• 2 Lumps of Sugar Make This Churchill Museum Totally Unique – Traveling Boy
• Flight attendants share what not to do on a plane – Woman and Home
• Footprints of the Maya – Traveling Boy
• This retired Gainesville pilot’s book on Delta’s history covers subjects from Scarlett O’Hara to civil rights – Gainesville Times
• Blank City | Full Movie | John Waters, Steve Buscemi, Jim Jarmusch, Lydia Lunch, Debbie Harry – YouTube
• Melville’s Le samouraï – A Look Back at the Classic French Noir – Traveling Boy
• Pole Dancing and cannabis at The Artist Tree in Weho,

The post See the World in March with Traveling Boy appeared first on Traveling Archive.

The hit Canadian TV series Our City Tonight interviews T-Boy Editor Ed Boitano

• T-Boy Society of Film, Travel & Music: Travel Nightmares: Travel Lessons Learned
• Attention Seniors 65+! San Diego Zoo is free the whole month of February 2023.
• Twenty-three minutes of New Orleans – By filmmaker Jay Bogas
• T-Boy Society of Film, Travel & Music: T-Boy Society of Film and Music’s Favorite Museums
• The 10 problems that could ruin your 2023 holiday. (telegraph.co.uk)
• T-Boy Society of Film, Travel & Music: Favorite State for a Food  Experience
• Lithuania’s Hill of the Crosses – By filmmaker Captain Ron Stowe
• Walt Mundkowsky: Time Capsule Cinema: Petulia – (Traveling Boy)
• Bearing Witness: Selected Works by Chiura Obata – (southernthing.com)

The post See the World in February with Traveling Boy appeared first on Traveling Archive.

The hit Canadian TV series Our City Tonight interviews T-Boy Editor Ed Boitano

• Christmas Recipes – NYT Cooking (nytimes.com)
• How To Store Your Holiday Leftovers and Avoid Foodborne Illness (verywellhealth.com)
• Pizza Napoletana: Naple’s Gift to the World – (Traveling Boy)
• Where to Eat in London’s East End (travelandleisure.com)
• Best Hanukkah Recipes – Recipes from NYT Cooking (nytimes.com)
• Pilgrimages: Places I’ll Remember – (Traveling Boy)
• A Magical Walk Through Hemingway’s Paris – (Traveling Boy)
• Get your holiday shopping done in these Mississippi towns – (southernthing.com)
• An Activity for Each Day of the Holiday Season – (nycgo.com)
• “Divisive Concepts” Bans Will Undermine Teaching Some of the Values Conservatives Claim to Uphold – (historynewsnetwork.org)

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