Die Nibelungen: Siegfried
Fritz Lang, Germany, 1924, 143 min

 

Siegfried, son of King Sigmund, hears of the beautiful sister of Gunter, King of Worms, Kriemhild. On his way to Worms, he kills a dragon and finds a treasure, the Hort. He helps Gunther to win Krimhild, a mask that makes him invisible proves to be very useful. But because Brunhild is cursing Kriemhild, she tells her what really happened. Now Brunhild wants Siegfried’s head. Is Gunther going to do her that favor? – IMDb

 

Die Nibelungen: Kriemhilds Rache
Fritz Lang, Germany, 1924, 144 min

 

After Siegfried’s dead, Kriemhild marries Etzel, the King of the Huns. She gives birth to a child, and invites her brothers for a party. She tries to persuade Etzel and the other Huns, that they kill Hagen, the murderer of Siegfried, but he is protected by her brothers. A fierce battle begins to force her brothers to give Hagen to her. – IMDb

 

Psych Burn
J.X. Williams, USA, 1968, 3 min, 16 mm

 

Psych-Burn was what musicians call a ‘contract-breaker’. ABC had given us some coin to make a few short films for a TV Pilot. “Love-In Tonite” was to be a psychedelic rock variety show with live performances, skits, and whatnot to cash in on the emerging hippie demographic. Even pre-Disney, the network was riddled with a bunch of out-of-touch, pencil-pushing buffoons, so I quickly realized the show would be a disaster. Imagine if “Midnight Special” was produced by Aaron Spelling. Then cast Charles Nelson Reilly as emcee. That would have been a far more lively show than ‘Love-In Tonite’. So I decided to deliver the suits a farewell kick-in-the-butt called ‘Psych-Burn’. The best part was that they presented my film sight unseen at a board meeting about the new Fall Season. I heard some heads rolled over that one. – J.X. Williams

Mon oncle Antoine
Claude Jutra, Canada, 1971, 110 min 20 s

 

‘Le plus grand film canadien de tous les temps’

 

L’atmostmosphère d’une petite ville minière du Québec des années 1940, la veille de Noël. Insouciante pour quelques heures, la population, rassemblée au magasin général, oublie sa pauvreté. Aux aguets, Benoit, un garçon de quinze ans : il découvre le monde des adultes, celui des sensations, de la souffrance et des petites folies, qui, pour un instant, prennent un air de bonheur. Avec Jean Duceppe, Jacques Gagnon, Olivette Thibault, Monique Mercure, Lionel Villeneuve.

 

 

The Century Of Self 
Adam Curtis, UK, 2002, 240 minutes

 

Part 1 : Happiness Machines
Part 2 : The Engineering of Consent
Part 3 : There is a Policeman Inside All Our Heads: He Must Be Destroyed
Part 4 : Eight People Sipping Wine in Kettering

 

The story of the relationship between Sigmund Freud and his American nephew, Edward Bernays. Bernays invented the public relations profession in the 1920s and was the first person to take Freud’s ideas to manipulate the masses. He showed American corporations how they could make people want things they didn’t need by systematically linking mass-produced goods to their unconscious desires.

Bernays was one of the main architects of the modern techniques of mass-consumer persuasion, using every trick in the book, from celebrity endorsement and outrageous PR stunts, to eroticising the motorcar.

His most notorious coup was breaking the taboo on women smoking by persuading them that cigarettes were a symbol of independence and freedom. But Bernays was convinced that this was more than just a way of selling consumer goods. It was a new political idea of how to control the masses. By satisfying the inner irrational desires that his uncle had identified, people could be made happy and thus docile.

It was the start of the all-consuming self which has come to dominate today’s world.

 

***

 

Comment ça marche / Explique-moi la vie

 

 

Manufacturing Consent – Noam Chomsky and the Media
Mark Achbar & Peter Wintonick, Canada, 1992, 167 min 15 s

 

Pour faire suite au billet du 2 décembre :

 

A Fire In My Belly (Film In Progress)
David Wojnarowicz, USA, 1986-87, Super 8mm film, black and white & color, Silent

 

In November 2010, G. Wayne Clough, Secretary of the Smithsonian, removed Wojnarowicz’s short silent film A Fire in My Belly from the exhibit « Hide/Seek: Difference and Desire in American Portraiture » at the National Portrait Gallery after complaints from the Catholic League and Rep. John Boehner. One segment of the film shows ants crawling over a crucifix.

In response, The Andy Warhol Foundation, which had co-sponsored the exhibition, announced that it would not fund future Smithsonian projects, while several institutions, including SFMOMA, scheduled showings of the removed work.