buena vista distribution company

Though I can’t say that all of these titles are exactly deserving of our nostalgia, we did appreciate this list of cult classics on offer from the newest entrant in the walled-garden-secret-garden-bridge-to-terabithia of streaming television—especially for the recommendation of the Escape to Witch Mountain (1975) and sequels and Darby O’Gill and the Little People (1959), both which were quite affecting for an impressionable child. Wanting to be both Tony and Tia, I am just learning that the actress portraying one of the preternaturally gifted orphans of the the former is Kim Richards, a future Real Housewife (see also) of Beverly Hills.

post-production

Though feeling far less cinematically informed than in previous years, this rundown of 2019’s Box Office portrayed in Simpsons’ screen captures brilliant curated by Hannah Woodhead (via Kottke) taught me everything I need to know to catch up. The Lighthouse from Max and Robert Eggers starring Willem Dafoe and Robert Pattison was one I got right away (and the treatment reminded me of these memes of last year’s Academy Award contenders) but be sure to check out the whole thread at the link above.

maclunkey

From the Hollywood script writers’ podcast Story Break (previously here and here) who’ve imagined and pitched such properties as Jar-Jar: A Star Wars Story, we’re treated to their signature treatment of another subtitle re-mastering of the franchise and how such a directorial decision could have larger implications—including not in the least the opportunity (nay, duty) to explore what the change signifies. In the original edition of Star Wars: A New Hope, a pivotal, expository scene Greedo, a bounty-hunter from the planet Rodia commissioned by Jabba the Hutt, encounters his target, smuggler Hans Solo, at the cantina of Mos Eisley (“a wretched hive of scum and villany”) and girds himself to deliver Solo to Jabba dead or alive.
Originally, Solo is depicted as killing Greedo, a decision which the director later recants, fearing it portrays one of the Rebellion’s unwilling heroes as cold-blooded and alters footage to reform Solo’s moral ambiguity by initially in 1997 having Greedo fire his blaster first and then in another special edition, portraying both firing simultaneously in 2004, in 2012 owing that the original portrayal was canon and then just within the past week debuted another edit to mark the occasion of its intellectual heirs’ premiere of its streaming service, this time with the exchanged subtitled except on Greedo’s last words before dying which audiences transcribe as either the title or possibly a Huttese phrase “ma klounkee.” Those last words still a mystery one fun tangent that the storyboarding session explored early on was that the Bounty Hunter’s Tale was a Star Wars-Groundhog Day mash-up and Greedo was caught in a Force temporal loop—the only escape being to finally kill Han Solo and we’ll go through an infinite number of variations, the same day repeated over and over again, accompanied by the musical stylings of Figrin D’an and the Modal Nodes. Do check out the whole episode at the link above and find out where they ultimately took this idea.

areopagitica

With the extended expository title, A speech of Mʳ John Milton (previously) for the Liberty of Vnlicenc’d Printing, to the Parlament of England, published this day in 1644 during the height of the Civil War is one of most impassioned and enduring appeals to the freedom of expression and invective against censorship.
Referencing a speech delivered by fourth century BC Athenian oratory Isocrates from the Areopagus hill facing the Acropolis arguing for restoration of the power of the council for conducting tribunals, John Milton’s thirty page pamphlet criticises the government for refuting the works of authors without due examination and quashing publication before allowing the public to weigh on the merit of an article or essay. “A good Booke is the precious life-blood of a master-spirit, imbalm’d and treasur’d up on purpose to a life beyond life.” Though not immediately securing press freedoms with parliament continuing with its pre-publication censorship with the intent to suppress what it deemed libelous or seditious, Milton’s polemic communicated to the public the importance of publishing houses being independent of government influence and how their methods were arbitrary and prone to backfire.

a domestic political errand

Concluding the last scheduled day of public testimony, former top Eurasian advisor to the White House, Fiona Hill yesterday echoed the ominous warning that Robert Mueller issued at the end of his investigation regarding election interference and the internecine political distrust that has been engendered all around and demanded, unflinchingly and in no uncertain terms that Republican representatives and those supporting Trump stop peddling the false narrative that Ukraine, to the exclusion of Russia, was behind the meddling in the 2016 election.
Discounting the irreproachable evidence gathered by foreign and domestic intelligence services and corroborated by the press in order to put a legitimising spin on Trump’s criminal behaviour, they have embraced an incendiary and disproven conspiracy theory and turned to rumour mongering—propagated by the same Russian Agitprop machine, to denigrate and disparage Ukraine and those connected with it and construct a reason to withhold military aid other than Trump’s smear campaign against the Bidens. Ukrainian ombudsman David Holmes also appeared before the panel as a witness, reaffirming previous testimony regarding incriminating telephone calls between Trump and the EU ambassador.

unser sandmännchen

While production had already commenced at a West Berlin studio for release to coincide with the beginning of Advent on 1 December, East German television (previously) debuted its own, arguably pirated version of the beloved Hans Christian Anderson character on this day in 1959.
From then on, until reunification in 1991, two versions of the children’s show were broadcast—the above for Eastern audiences and “Das Sandmännchen” for the West. The Eastern version was ultimately far more popular and widely embraced, especially by a population who saw corporate misappropriation of a beloved character to promote a capitalist message. Aired in the evenings, just before bedtime, the closing verse went: “Kinder, liebe Kinder, es hat mir Spaß gemacht. Nun schnell ins Bett und schlaft recht schön. Dann will auch ich zur Ruhe gehn. Ich wünsch euch gute Nacht.” During the 1980s, there was a regular circulation of companion characters, Pittiplatsch, Herr Fuchs, Frau Elster, from the show assigned to give the Abendgruß according to a set schedule.

chicken kyiv

Clearly recalling a college professor explaining to the class the nuance of how Kosovo was stressed was a political issue, this highly glommable extract from the impeachment hearings on the native pronunciation of Kyiv (Київ) really appealed to us. Exonymy is potentially problematic enough on its own but is doubly compounded with the introduction of geopolitics and proxy warfare. If anything good comes of annexation and awkward alliances, it would be the dropping of the definite article the and that the capital is unnuanced more pronounced as Keeve.