Farmer Town

I take screenshots of everything I watch. I would normally use the Windows Key + Print Screen feature but this would save the images as PNGs which took up a lot of space. I had to use Darktable, the open source alternative to Lightroom, to convert all these images (a couple thousand) into JPEGs. I installed Lightshot, a screenshotting tool. I set up a hotkey so now my screenshots are saved to a folder as JPEGs so that works well.

Its hard to explain just go watch it. Top 3 of the year. I did try to watch The Cook, The Thief, His Wife and Her Lover   but around 4 minutes in the nudity and atmosphere was too much for my tastes and in disgust, I deleted the film from my computer. I'm supposed to be watching Spiritual Voices but its 4 hours long and I don't want to but I'm done with schoolwork and have nothing better to do.

A lot of people miss Group B rallying. The 80s era of rallying when the WRC was dominated by the FIA's Group B class. This allowed manufacturers to go wild, no longer held back by homologation or perfomace limits. The popular phrase "0 to 60 in 2.3 seconds on gravel" is used to express just how powerful these cars were. The Lancia Delta S4's engine was able to produce 1000hp during some tests. These are F1 levels of power on a hatchback blazing through country roads. However nostlagia for Group B is mostly expressed by people around my age who weren't alive during this era of rallying. The cars were simply too fast and dangerous. Mechanics would find severed fingers inside the intake from crowds trying to touch passing cars . The drivers' reaction times were tested having to do their best to avoid crowds (especially during the Rallye du Portuglal). Peugeot 205 performing a Scandinavian flick.

A post on Group A and Group B rallying will be up by the end of the week. I still have coursework to do.   Lancia. The most successful marque in rallying history.   Unfortunately a lot of the content from early Group A rallies aren't in English.

I always knew there was a connection between trap music and illegal night time racing. Built a whole playlist around it.      I recently discovered PINKFLAMINGO a group that goes around documenting various car communities around the US. These communities are located in areas known for trap music (Altanta, New York, Detroit, Los Angeles) with even rapper Lil Yachty and his Ferrari featuring in one of their documentary films.  The culture of Japanese illegal street racing is being kept alive in the US. Just search "Atlanta street racing" newsclips on YouTube. A culture that declined in 1999 after Tokyo police started to crackdown on it. All that's left now are VHS tapes that circulate on obscure Japanese blogs and forums half of which are on blogs.yahoo.co.jp, a service that no longer exists. With their editing, wide angle lenses and 4:3 aspect ratio, the anonymous PINKFLAMINGO manages to capture this revived subculture perfectly. Fireworks and Donuts...

A favourite from this week was The Conformist (1970) also photographed by Vittorio Storaro. A movie about Clerici, a man in 1930s Fascist Italy with a desire to conform, to live a 'normal' life. Without going into too much detail, I believe that the message of the film is that all fascists are closeted homosexuals struggling with their sexuality Clerici grew up in an affluent household and was molested by his driver. In the final part of the film, after the fall of Mussolini, it ends with appears to be Clerici finally accepting who he is. The ending is open to interpretation. When it came to cinematography 2 things stood out. The first was the aspect ratio. 1.67:1 (or 5:3). A very strange choice. I would normally expect a 4:3 or 1.85:1 anamorphic for a film like this but it works. The second is covered in the video above. While watching, the centre line stood out when it came to framing subjects. I added a 4x4 grid to help see how the composition was lined up. A si...

I recently started a Letterboxd account here . I watched Francis Ford Coppola's One from The Heart . I only watched it for the cinematography by Vittorio Storaro, who worked with Coppola on Apocalypse Now . The story was simple and very straightforward that turns into a musical halfway through. There are major themes but I don't feel like talking about them. The production design was amazing but there were moments where I could clearly see the edges of the sound stage. Otherwise a pretty interesting movie and I recommend it. Films like this will never be made anymore. Columbia Pictures.

"This was a shit show. We've got the streets of New York turned into the O.K. Corral. Do you have any idea how much this is gonna cost the city. I've got the mayor, the governor and the president gunning for my head." Jocko was red with anger and fear. He stood in the aftermath of the attack, where Harvey Weinstein had been released by mercenaries.  David sat next to him, his arm in a sling after a paramedic stiched him back up. The scene was full of emergency services and newscasters. In all this commosion, David drowned out all the sounds, he was only focused on one thing. The card given to him by Kevin Spacey. It was a plain white businees card with a phone number hand written on to it. David took Jocko aside and said, "I'm leaving. I need to rest." "Take it easy Dave. I'll handle all this. I still owe you for that thing we did in Arkansas." David walked all the way to Central Park. He was still dressed in his Elon Musk sneaking ...