Dit clipje is al 5 miljoen keer bekeken op Youtube. Dit is te merkwaardiger, omdat het om kunstgeschiedenis gaat. Het toont hoe de vrouw in de loop van de kunstgeschiedenis wordt afgebeeld. Het clipje is uitermate mooi gemaakt: de portretten vloeien naadloos in elkaar over. Een echte aanrader!

DIV

DIV

A presentation for my English course:

Why Dead End?

I first saw this movie in 2005, and I was absolutely terrified, it scared the hell out of me. It is an example of what I call ‘an intelligent horror movie’.

I’ ve been analysing why this film struck me so much and tried to understand which are the components of a good horror movie, or rather a fantastic movie

Dead End was released in 2004; the Director is Jean Baptist Andrea. It won the Grand Prize of European Fantasy Film in Silver at the Brussels International Festival of Fantasy Film.

Although it is a low budget production - what is called a B-film-, in my opinion, it is a very good movie. It is creepy and disturbing.

The plot

For the past 20 years, Frank Harrington has driven his family to celebrate Christmas with his mother-in-law. Each time, he has taken the highway. This year, he takes a shortcut. It's the biggest mistake of his life. The family end up on a lonely road through a dark forest. Frank falls asleep and manages to avoid a crash with an oncoming car. (an early clue).

Then, the nightmare begins. A mysterious woman in white, carrying a baby, wanders through the forest. The hell breaks lose and family members start to be taken one by one by a terrifying black car resembling a hearse (a long vehicle used for carrying the coffin at a funeral). Each time their bodies are found a few miles further down the road, heavily  mutilated.

Every road sign points to a mysterious town Marcott, a destination they never reach, and the road seems never ending. The survivors start to panic and become mad. Deeply hidden family secrets come to the surface.

In short: Christmas, which is supposed to be a holiday full of peace and joy,  turns out into a living hell.

No gory horror

It ‘s not a traditional horror film: there isn ‘t very much gore and blood in it. However, gruesome, horrible things happen, the characters are one by one killed and mutilated. But this is only suggested, not shown. Suggesting is much more powerful than showing; psychological tension is (at least in my opinion) more horrifying than the bloodiest details. In this way, Dead End resembles other masterpieces of horror fiction, such as Psycho (1960) by Alfred Hitchcock, or The Blair Witch Project (1999) by Daniel Myrinck.

The real horror –in the minds of the characters and the viewers- comes from not knowing what is happening. Is it a psychopath on the loose doing these terrible things? Or is here a supernatural reality interfering with ‘normal’ reality? Who is the mysterious women in the white dress, with her baby; who appears to be dead. Who is the man in the black car, and why would they want to kill the family?

The setting

The setting creates a hallucinating sphere:  the inky dark wood, the endless, desolate  road and the Marcott sign. There are no side roads, no stores, no houses, just a straight road leading no where. They pass the same Marcot sign again and again. What the hell is Marcott? There seems to be no escape from this nightmare.

The setting is minimalist, repetitive and dreamlike/nightmarish. It makes you think of David Lynch. Cinematographically, there ‘s a lot of playing with the contrast between dark and light: the lights of the car versus the dark, creepy wood.

Characters and acting

There ‘s good acting, despite what we see in most B-films. Although horrible things are happening, the movie concentrates most on the psychology of the character: how they relate to each other, how they cope with the horror.

Under the stress and the tension, the image of a ‘normal’ middle class family collapses; deeply buried family secrets come to the surface: suddenly, the daughter confesses she is pregnant, the son smokes pot, both the father and the mother have had extramarital affairs and, worse of all: the son is not the biological son of Frank.

Black humour

This is also an characteristic that reminds of David Lynch

Franks tries to phone the police, but the phone doesn’t work: Laura asks him: “Did you get the police?“ –“No, I forgot the number of the 1-1-1”

The family is completely lost, they are in a place out of the blue. Frank asks Laura if she has brought the map. She hasn‘t and Frank is angry. Laura answers: “Next time, I‘ll bring a globe, in case you feel like driving to my mother ‘s by way of the north pole.”

Op youtube is een massa videomateriaal, dat wil aantonen dat er meer aan de hand is met 9/11 dan wat de officiële media vertellen, dat een staalconstructie van een wolkenkrabber niet door vuur kan ineenstorten, dat binnenin bommen explodeerden, die de toren deden imploderen. Ik weet ook niet wat daarvan waar is. Geloof niet alles wat je op video ziet, en bewaar je kritische zin. Maar het is wel boeiend, al die samenzweringstheorieën ...

Nog heel eventjes over mijn methode, om de kritiek te weerleggen dat het brengen van youtubeclipjes al te gemakkelijk zou zijn. Als er binnen de 2 à 3 seconden niets gebeurt, of als het niet duidelijk is wat er gaat gebeuren: FORGET IT ! Dit clipje breng ik niet! Ervaring heeft mij geleerd wat goede clipjes zijn: ze beginnen snel, hebben een duidelijke verhaalslijn, met begin, midden en einde. Het zijn in essentie mini-filmpjes.

I certainly wasn 't the only one, being horrified by 'The Blair Witch Project', to such an extent I daren' t turn off the light. However, the story is simple: some students of a movie academy start a journey through the woods, in order to investigate the story of the 'Blair Witch'. The fictional identification is made through the use of so-called footage, made by the students. It 's shaky and amateuristic, so that you come to identify with it. At the end of the movie, you really don 't know what has happened, which is a quality of an 'intelligent' horror movie...For, if explaining too much, it surely spoils our viewing pleasure...

German Couple Wants Incest Legalized - Watch more amazing videos here

Ik heb een aantal clipjes uit Youtube gebracht, waarin ik julie al vertelde over mijn fascinatie voor het karakter van de Amerikaanse medic Eugene, tijdens de slag om Bastogne. Uit dit clipje blijkt dat hij Eugene Roe heette. Zo helepn Youtubers elkaar verder... Daarom, als eerbetoon aan de Amerikaanse medic Eugene Roe, dit clipje...

This is the victory of international law over tyranny and violation of human rights...

Deze clip bevat extreem geweld en mag niet gezien worden door jonge of gevoege kijkers...

Alle archetypische schonigheid op een hoedje gegooid, laten we eens kijken waar Jeanne d' Arc echt voor stond: de macht van de wil, van het geweld... Het gezicht van Jeanne die 'la Tourelle' aanvalt' 1) doet mij verliefd worden op haar 2) is het perfecte 'exemplum' van de Niezschiaanse 'Wille zur Macht'...

Hoe mooi die twee films ook mogen zijn die de laatste jaren over Jeanne d' Arc zijn gemaakt, blijft dat we ontzettend weinig weten over haar historisch personage. Ik heb een dure eed voor mezelf gezworen: zijnde een historicus, ik zal niet sterven, vooraleer ik de originele processtukken van het proces van Jeanne d'Arc in 1429/30 in Rouen zal doorwoorstelen...

Uiteindelijk, in 1430, wordt Jeanne d' Arc als een heks en ketteres tot de brandstapel veroordeeld. Heeft ze haar historische opdracht, haar opgedragen door God, vervuld? Of was ze slechts een fantasievolle leugenares? Je zou voor minder vervuld zijn van innerlijke twijfel, als de vlammen van de brandstapel jouw lichaam beginnen te verkolen, het lichaam van een meisje van amper 19 jaar...

Ik weet niet waarom, maar het historisch personage van Jeanne d' Arc heeft mij altijd ten diepste ontroerd. Ik heb mij altijd afgevraagd waarom? Is het omdat zij het archetype is van de vrouwelijke krijgster? (een archetype dat verloren is gegaan in het hedendaagse feminisme, met hun obsessie van integratie in de 'mannelijke' bureaucultuur?). Of omdat zij beweerde in contact te staan met God? Waarbij er altijd de bijbedenking is dat zij misschien aan een psychiatrische stoornis leidde? Of is het omdat zij aan de narratieve structuren beantwoordde van de eeuwige, menselijke archetypen van opgang, succes, hoogmoed, en uiteindelijk verval?...Ik weet het niet, geniet in alle geval van dit clipje. Ik moet zeggen dat ik de andere recente versie van Jeanne d' Arc door Luc Bresson verkies, waarin een veel 'hardere', minder geïdealiseerde Jeanne wordt tentoongespreid. Een meer realistische versie?...Wie zal het weten?

In deze versie hou ik geweldig veel van Peter O' Toole, als het personage van Pierre Cauchon, bisschop van Rouen, die met alle mogelijke middelen Jeanne probeert te redden van de politieke machinaties van Engeland, die haar zo vlug mogelijk als heks wil zien te verbranden...

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DIV

- Jeanne d ‘Arc: I was about 10 years old. I was taking my ?.to the forest, when this strange wind began to blow. There was such a strange sound, almost like words, calling me. Everything was moving so fast. I couldn’t ‘ move, I couldn’t breathe. God had given me a message, a message to deliver.
- Charles, Dauphin of France: What was the message?
- Jeanne d ‘Arc: He said that I must save France from her enemies and bring her back into the hands of god
- Jeanne d ‘Arc: Follow me!
- Messenger: She was on her white horse facing the whole English army and she drove them away.

- The 'Devil' (personification of Jeanne 's hybris): That’s too easy.
- Adviser of Charles VII, King of France: We must be absolutely certain that she is not an instrument of the devil.
- Queen-Mother: The girl is crazy.
- Charles VII, King of France: We are of course enormously grateful for your past efforts. But now your task is done.
- Henri V, King of England: I want that girl, burnt.
- Pierre Cauchon, Bishop of Rouen: You are not helping yourself by refusing to submit to our judgment.
- Jeanne d ‘Arc: You, who claim to be my judges, you ought to be careful!
- An ecclesiastical judge: You think that God made the right decision to take an ignorant girl to save the kingdom of France?
- The 'Devil': Who are you to even think you can know the difference between good and evil?
- Jeanne d ‘Arc: I ‘m just a messenger.

I posted several episodes of 'Band of Brothers during the Battle of the Bulge (=the Ardennes campaign.). These are clips uploaded by amateurs, who rip dvd 's or make viderecordings of the series, while it 's still playing on television. Unfortunately, the person on whom I depended for the clips, removed his stuff. I 've experienced it so many times that vidoclips on Youtube etc. sometimes have a very ephemeral life.

I was so keen on bringing the episode in which the Belgian nurse Renée was killed when the Bastogne hospital was destroyed by shelling. The only thing that was left of her was her blue nurse cap, which the American medic Eugene found. Afterwards he used Renée 's blue cap as a bandage for a heavily wounded comrade. I found this a very captivating symbol of wat war really is. unfortunately, I wasn 't able to find this episode again.

You may ask why I 'm bringing this 'Band of Brothers' clips? Becauser I 'm not a militaristically oriented personality, nor do I glorify war! But I think an intelligent personality, who is interested in any form of human behaviour, should have a notion of what war is really like. Because war, whether you may like it or not, is a very essential compenent of human experience.

Fortunately, we Europeans have known peace for a very long period, nearly sixty years. Historically, this is a very, very long episode. I think the only comparable war-free period was the first half of the 19th century, between the end of the Napoleonic wars in 1815 and the Crimean war in 1853-56.

I also am very interested in the changing concept of war in the 21st century. However disguisting ad immoral the methods of Al Qaeda are, you cannot have but respect for their geniality in understanding modern violence and warfare. Because nowadays wars are not won by mass armies, as they were in the past, but by small groups of highly competent terrorists and commando's, who have an excellent knowledge of computer and internet technology. And external interstate wars are giving way to internal civil wars. That why the American military doctrine, underlying its military policy in Irak, is failing. Superpowers such as the US can still militarily win wars, but they fail to capitalize military victories into diplomatic and political capital.

I would like to wrie an essay on the changing concept of warfare in the 21st century. I have a very extend knowledge on military history, but I still have to do a lot of research, in order to reach this goal.

Meanwile, look at this clip of 'Band of Brothers' in the Battle of the Bulge. At the end of this episode, as my memory does not lure me, the paratroopers of the 101st Airbourne Division, are trying to recapture Foy, of which they had pulled out. You see Captain Dick Winters, now acting Comander of Second Batallion, but former commander of Easy Company. You see Colonel Sink of 506th Regiment calling him back, as he might be killed. Higher ranking officers should not be exposed to the fysical dangers of the fighting, such is the law of warfare, not because they are cowards, but because military leadership is extremely important in warfare. For if the leaders are killed, a unit can totally disintegrate and be routed. You see how Lieutenant Dyke, a totally incompetant Westpoint officer, is during the attack replaced by Robert Spears, a very competant military and a hero, but also a very cruel officer. For ikt was known the, while in Normandy, he offered cigarettes to German POW 's (=prisoners of war), and then killing them all with his submachinegun...

You also see how some of the troopers go 'berserk' as they say. 'Going berserk' means that the stress and the adrenaline of the fighting makes some soldiers totally unaware of their natural survival instinct. Such as this trooper who on his own runs towards the murdurous 88-mm German gun, so that its canonniers are totally surprised and give up...

In this episode, one of the soldiers had been wounded by the Germans and his comrades could 'n save him due to heavy fire, so that he bleeded to death. I am extremely fond of the character of the medic Eugene, with his sullen, depressed face. It is the face of a soldier on the brink of a nervous breakdown, because having seen so much suffering and madness, but still doing his duty to his comrades.

Captain Winters, now Batallion Officer, sits for a while between his former soldiers of Easy Company, of which he had been the leader since Normandy. Cause Easy is still his preferred child and one of his children had been killed...

Meanwile medic Eugene has to care for another plague amongst the troopers of Easy: trench foot, caused by freezing and wet feet. Because try to keep you socks dry in the horror of the snowy Ardennes...

We learn more about the character of medic Eugene, in the foxhole of the medics. 'Hey, what do you call these people again, those Cajun healers?-'Traiteurs. You know, my grandma was a traiteuse', says Eugene. 'Layed her hands on people, and cured them, took away sickness, cancer, you name it. I remember she used to pray a lot. Talked to God about the pain she 'd put out. Asked him to carry it away. That 's what she did;'

In the last scene of this part, the fog finally clears away, so that the Americans in the sourrounded Bastogne can be resupplied by  the C47 's of the American Airborne. We also see the character of the Belgian nurse Renée, who will play a very important part in the life of the American medic Eugene, and of which I will tell you later...

(Why I am doing all this 1) because I want lo learn to write fiction 2) because I want to write English fiction and 3) because I am in love with the characters of the American medic Eugene and the Belgian nurse Renée. For only if you are in love with your fictional characters, can you write touching fiction...

One of the most touching episodes of 'Band of Brothers' is the one about Bastogne. Powerful SS and Whermacht armoured Divisions had broken down into the Ardennes American lines in december1944, in a desperate attempt to split the Allied Forces in two, and reach Antwerp, which would, in the lunatic mind of Hitler, end the war in the West. The Nazi efforts concentrated on Bastogne, an important traffic hub. The weaker and green infantry divisions having been destroyed, it was the task of the elite 101st Airbourne Division to defend this city, until they were totally surrounded by superior German Panzer and Volksgrenadier Divisions...In this scene you see one of the main characters, called Eugene, a medic, who wil be dominant into the whole Bastogne episode. You also see captain Dick Winters, executive comander of the Second Batallion. He had been the commander of Easy Company (whid means E-company), since the Landings in Normandy. In fact he always had felt a little bit overpromoted, since he had after the campaign Market Garden In Holland, been promoted to Second Batalion of 506th Regiment. Together they take a poor German soldier into captivity.

Then Brigade General McAulliffe, appears in his jeep. He was the acting commanding officer of the 101st Airbourne Division, since the actual CIC Major-General Taylor was on Holiday in Washington. He 's accompanied by Colonel Sink , Commander of the 506th Regiment, of which Easy Company was a part. In fact after the name of Colonel Sink, this Regiment was called the '50Sinks'.

'First Batttalion 's pulled out of Foy. Heavy casualties. There 's a whole lot of shit heading this way', says McAuliffe. 'Tanks, artillery, mecanised guns, you can forget about air cover'. For the fog immobilised the superior Allied Air cover. 'Hang tough! Hold the line!..' That 's what our poor paratroopers had to do with...

Hoewel ik hier nogal wat anti-Amerikaanse geluiden laat horen, heb ik toch een geweldig respect voor de Amerikaanse soldaat. Ik heb bijna alle boeken platgelezen over de Amerikaanse GI 's in de Tweede Wereldoorlog, hun ervaringen vanaf de woestijnoorlog in Noord-Afrika, de grimmige strijd in de Italiaanse bergen, de bloederige bestorming van de stranden van Normandië, het bloedbad in het Hürtgenwald, de hel van het Ardennenoffensief, tot de ineenstoring van het uitgeputte duitsland in april/mei 1945. De laatste 15 jaar zijn heel veel boeken verschenen over de persoonlijke ervaringen van Amerikaanse GI 's in WOII, waarvan 'Band of Brothers' door de verfilming het meest bekend is. Nu is er een schitterend boek op de markt gekomen 'De hel die Europa heet. Amerikaanse frontsoldaten in de Tweede Wereldoorlog' aan de hand van Peter Schrijvers. Een absolute aanrader. Het gaat over de perceptie door Amerikaanse soldaten van de natuur in Europa (de strijd werd vooral op het platteland gestreden, niet in steden), wat ze dachten over hun Britse en Franse bondgenoten, en -wat zeer interessant is-, hoe ze stonden tegenover de Duitse vijand. Hun perceptie wisselde tussen drie polen: 1) de superieure, moedige Duitser, 2) de wrede, listige vijand, en tenslotte 3) de uitgebluste en uitgeputte Duitser op het eind van de oorlog. Tenslotte gaat het boek over de ervaringen van Amerikaanse soldaten met de Europese burgerbevolking. Als je echt niet weet wat doen, kan ik je ten zeerste dit boek aanbevelen. Het is zeer goed geschreven, en gebaseerd op brieven, dagboeken en persoonlijke documenten van GI 's. Mijn anti-amerikanisme beterft niet het Amerikaanse volk, maar de Bush-administratie. Daarom dit clipje uit youtube, een hommage aan de Amerikaanse soldaat in Irak als mens...

 

 

 

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