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The Great Mountain Crags of Scotland: A Celebration of Scottish Mountaineering

Guy Robertson and Adrian Crofton

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Book

The Great Mountain Crags of Scotland is a celebration of climbing in Scotland's wild places,...

Deutsch <-> Englisch KOMPAKT Wörterbuch

Reference and Education

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A medium-sized dictionary with 330,000 keywords, phases and translations. * Current and...

Alexis Taylor recommended Il Vangelo Secondo Matteo (The Gospel According To St. Matthew) by Luis Enrique Bacalov in Music (curated)

"It's a film that my parents introduced me to when I was younger that's by a director called Pasolini. It's a black and white film about the life and times of Jesus Christ. The only words on screen are words from the Bible. So it's a quite direct representation of that particular gospel story, according to Matthew, but it's a really inventive film. The director may have taken the story direct from the Bible, but what he does with the music and editing, as well as the use of non-actors in the film, it's just a really original and moving film. It features scenes where at points you're hearing a gospel song by Odetta, and she's singing a song called, 'Sometimes I Feel Like a Motherless Child' which is this amazing gospel tune. She's singing that to accompany scenes of the children being killed by Herod. The music in the film is very raw. It'll use a song that's going to spell something out literally. I don't know how Pasolini chose all these songs for the film or who was in charge of the music selection. You've got Blind Willie Johnson - the old blues artist - accompanying some of the miracle scenes where people are getting their sight back. It's an exercise in juxtaposing very disparate elements that actually really enhance each other. You have to second guess it though, because of the way it's edited, a scene will suddenly just be chopped really harshly, and the film will move on to something else. All of these things are very powerful - and unusual - devices in film-making. In a way, if it's not too pretentious to say it, some of that harsh editing and juxtaposing with disparate elements on screen with music is something that I feel inspired by in terms of making a record. Things don't always have to fit together neatly, or as you'd expect them to. If you think about it in terms of the Alex Chilton record I mentioned earlier, that album is kind of a guide through rock & roll, country and soul music or Americana if you like, and this one is a guide to raw, blues and gospel as well as a classical take on the gospel. It's a very eclectic soundtrack with music that definitely enhances what's going on on the screen. It's very powerful music in its own right."

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Gareth von Kallenbach (980 KP) rated Get Out (2017) in Movies

Jul 12, 2019

Get Out (2017)

2017 | Horror, Thriller

8.0

(208 Ratings)

Movie Rating

ritten and directed by Jordan Peele, “Get Out” is not so much an actual horror film but more of a dark comedy. The plot is filled with political undertones, spotlighting awkward racial interactions that are shadowed by systemic inequality.
Chris Washington (Daniel Kaluuya) and Rose Armitage (Allison Williams) are a vibrant young couple living in the city. He’s a photographer. Not sure what she does. He’s black. She’s white. After dating for four months, Rose convinces Chris to go on a trip to meet her parents. Chris is apprehensive at first and skeptical about how her parents will react to meeting their daughter’s black boyfriend. Rose laughs that off and everything seems fine as they head to the country.
From this point forward the film starts to build in creepiness. It almost has the feel of an M. Night Shayamalan movie like “The Village.” As the plot develops, the audience knows they are supposed to be suspecting something creepy and sinister hiding behind images of normalcy. So everything begins to take on this feel. Rose’s family lives in a creepily perfect mansion in the country. They have a creepily quiet black groundskeeper and a creepily happy black maid.
Fortunately, two things save this film from becoming a hokey Shyamalan style disappointment. The plot is executed in a comedic fashion and it isn’t completely predictable.
The entire film balances a creepy-funny style. Moments of white people awkwardly trying to appear not-racist also build a suspenseful feeling that something darker is behind the surface.
Rose’s mom Missy (Catherine Keener) specializes in hypnosis. It quickly becomes clear that Missy is using mind control tactics to basically enslave black people. Under her spell, her victims take a psychological fall into a dark abyss and are left in a robotic state. It would have been nice if this aspect of the plot was given more screen time.
The film picks up pace when Rose’s parents host a “family” get together that actually turns out to be essentially a “slave” auction. It almost takes too much time to get to this point in the plot. A few more moments, and it would begin to feel like trudging through a repetitious build up. From here forward, it becomes pretty fast paced as Chris desperately tries to escape a horrific fate.
“Get Out” probably won’t actually scare anyone, but it is highly entertaining in a very dark way.

Kudos

Neon's Nerd Nexus (360 KP) rated Hustlers (2019) in Movies

Sep 16, 2019

Hustlers (2019)

2019 | Drama

6.1

(23 Ratings)

Movie Rating Watch

Diva is the female version of a Hustler

Hustlers is such an extremely glamorous and electrifying film that once you are pulled in and comfortable under its spell it rips the rug right from under you bringing you crashing down into the harsh realities of the real world. From its trailer you may dismiss Hustlers for being a seedy throw away cash grab movie but to do this you would be missing out on one of this years best films. Playing out somewhere between Widows and the Wolf Of Wall Street Hustlers is smart, hard hitting and classy with a perfect dash of comedy too. Shot exceptionally with fantastic cinematography Hustlers drips style and glam making it almost seem like a dizzying fantasy film at times. We are shown the harsh realities of the stripper industry and just how much hard work has to be put in constantly to get any kind kind of pay off back. These girls literally put their heart, sweat and tears into this job sacrificing their wellbeing and health just to pull the wool over the customers eyes making them believe its the place of their dreams so in turn they earn more money. Everything is a lie and the constant comparison of stripping and wall street is explored greatly with the line between whats wrong and right always being contested. Theres no doubt that what both sides do is wrong but the film brilliantly makes you care for both of them equally depicting both as victims just trying to get by in a harsh world but also as heartless animals doing anything to become top dog. Its all really is thought provoking stuff and some of its themes of how selfish, obsessive, disturbing, desensitized, cold & heartless we have all become are so relevant at the moment too. There's also a very heavy theme of rape and how no matter what the circumstances exploiting anyone in a vulnerable state is still taking advantage wrong and unacceptable on every level. Acting is superb too with Jennifer Lopez and Constance Wu putting in next level performances. Hustlers really impressed me, theres not one ounce of exposition here as all the film and its characters demand is that your paying attention assuming that you are smart enough to think for yourself instead which I truly admire.