Gem Club - Polly

Once this northern side of our planet starts to drift into coldness, songs like this make our darker days built more tolerable.

The Boston’s new full-length In Roses LP comes out January 28th on Hardly Art Records.

Previously: “Twins”

Cher worked out the tracklisting for her new album by listening to it on a trampoline every day.

“I’d jump on a trampoline for aerobics and listen to it every day, changing things around until it finally worked,” she mused to the Metro.

Amazing.

She also went on to shed some light on her creative process ‘vis-a-vis’ how sad a song can be.

“Even my saddest songs have a positive message. Both ‘Believe’ and ‘I Hope You Find It’ originally had a second verse that was the same as the first,” she explained.

“I told both writers: “There’s no fucking way I’m gonna be heartbroken for two verses. After one verse, it’s ‘fuck you, I’m outta here.’”

This kaleidoscopic compilation of soundtracks by Bernard Herrmann scored for film, television and radio presents a feature-length overview of this incredibly unique composer's wide-ranging and distinctive style. Working with directors such as Orson Welles, Alfred Hitchcock and Martin Scorsese, during a career that spanned over forty years, Herrmann created scores of such innovative and emotional magnitude that notions of sound and music in cinema have never been the same. The breadth and scope of Herrmann's ingenious composing, arranging and orchestrating talent is on full display here, from the use of the theremin in The Day The Earth Stood Still (1951), to the all-string "black & white" sound for Psycho (1960), and the whistled main title of The Twisted Nerve (1968). Despite a well-charted, stormy history of personal and professional battles, Herrmann could work effortlessly in many musical idioms, seemingly without pause, whether it be within the Romanticism of Jane Eyre (1943) and The Ghost and Mrs. Muir (1946) (his own favorite of his film scores), or in an austere, serialist format for the chilling radio drama, The Moat Farm Murders (1944). Herrmann's music can at times be confused with sound effects, for instance with the crashing timpani during the erupting volcano climax of Mysterious Island (1961). In fact, he sought to fuse all of the sonorous elements of the soundtrack—voice, sound effects and music—into "…something that comes out of the screen and engulfs the whole audience…. The screen itself dictates musical forms."* I've loosely arranged this 80 minute mix into four sections that showcase a few, but hardly all, of the facets of this composer's visionary music.
 

*Herrmann quoted in E. W. Cameron's Sound and the Cinema: The Coming of Sound to American Film.

Part of our on-going series, Notebook Soundtrack Mixes.

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Stream the mix below or download it here. Total running time: 80 minutes.

PART ONE: THE DIFFICULTY OF BEING

1. North By Northwest (1959), "Overture" (0:00)
2. Taxi Driver (1975), "Thank God For the Rain" (2:15)
3. Taxi Driver (1975) "Assassination Attempt" (edit) (3:51)
4. The Three Worlds Of Gulliver (1960) "The Tightrope" (edit) (4:19)
5. The Night Digger (1971) "Scene Seven" (edit) (4:39)
6. Vertigo (1958) "Scotty Tails Madeline #2" (edit) (5:36)
7. Marnie (1964) "Obsessions: (edit) (6:11)
8. Cape Fear (1962) "After The Dream" (edit) (7:22)
9. Vertigo (1958) "The Letter" (edit) (8:21)
10. Psycho (1960) "Marion and Sam" (edit) (9:50)
11. 5 Fingers (1952) "Departure 1" (edit) (11:29)
12. The Wrong Man (1956) "Stork Club" (13:19)
13. North By Northwest (1959) "The Airport" (13:46)
14. Sisters (1972) "Clean-up, The Search" (edit) (14:43)
15. The Night Digger (1971) "Scene Three" (edit) (15:42)
16. Marnie (1965) "Morning After" (edit) (16:19)
17. The Twilight Zone (1960) "The Lonely" (edit) (17:28)
18. The Wrong Man (1957) "Police Van" (18:16)
19. On Dangerous Ground (1951) "Snowstorm" (edit) (18:48)
20. The Kentuckian (1955) "Night Sounds" (edit) (20:14)
21. The Night Digger (1971) "Scene One" (edit) (21:10)
22. Fahrenheit 451 (1966) "Freedom" (edit) (21:38)
23. Fahrenheit 451 (1966) "The Vase" (edit( (22:09)
24. The Battle of Neretva (1970) "Retreat" (edit) (22:25)
25. The Snows of Kilimanjaro (1952) The Hyena" (edit) (22:50)
26. Marnie (1964) "A New Job" (edit) (24:13)
27. Marnie (1964) "The Return" (edit) (24:26)
28. Marnie (1964) "The Color Red" (edit) (25:03)
29. Marnie (1964) "The Despair" (edit) (25:32)
30. Twisted Nerve (1968) "Main Title" (edit) (25:47)
31. Twisted Nerve (1968) "Jazz" (edit) (26:22)
32. Taxi Driver (1976) "End Credits" (edit) (27:15)

PART TWO: DESCRIPTION OF A STRUGGLE

33. The Seventh Voyage of Sinbad (1958) "The Roc" (edit) (28:10)
34. The Three Worlds of Gulliver (1960) "Pursued by Giants" (edit) (30:00)
35. Mysterious Island (1961) "Escape To The Clouds" (edit) (30:46)
36. Collector's Item (1950's) "Suite" (edit) (32:04) unsold pilot for television
37. Torn Curtain (1966) "The Corridor" (edit) (33:11) unused score
38. Beneath The Twelve-Mile Reef (1953) "The Marker" (edit) (34:21)
39. The Day The Earth Stood Still (1951) "The Visor And The Ray" (edit) (35:56)
40. North By Northwest (1959) "On The Rocks" (edit) (37:36)
41. Collector's Item (1950's) "Suite" (edit) (38:15) unsold pilot for television
42. Garden of Evil (1954) "The Chasm" (edit) (38:48)
43. The Kentuckian (1955) "The Rope" (edit) (39:09)
44. Mysterious Island (1961) "Escape From The Island" (edit) (39:48)

PART THREE: FEAR EATS THE SOUL

45. The Day The Earth Stood Still (1951) "The Robot" (edit) (40:47)
46. The Moat Farm Murders (1944) "Suite" (edit 1) (41:42) for radio
47. The Moat Farm Murders (1944) "Suite" (edit 2) (42:17) for radio
48. The Moat Farm Murders (1944) "Suite" (edit 3) (43:04) for radio
49. The Twilight Zone (1959) "Where Is Everybody?" (edit) (44:16) television episode
50. Sisters (1972) "Phillip's Murder" (edit) (45:06)
51. Taxi Driver (1976) "Sport and Iris" (edit) (47:08)
52. A Hatful of Rain (1957) "The Sidewalk" (edit) (48:00)
53. Cape Fear (1962) "The Girl Is Found" (edit) (48:40)
54. Cape Fear (1962/1991) "Rape and Hospital" (edit) (48:53)
55. The Seventh Voyage of Sinbad (1958) "The Return" (edit) (49:55)
56. Garden of Evil (1954) "The Quarrel" (edit) (50:22)
57. Obsession (1976) "The Ferry" (50:46)
58. Fahrenheit 451 (1966) "Fire Station" (edit) (53:25)
59. The Three Worlds of Gulliver (1960) "The Crocodile" (edit) (54:18)
60. The Wrong Man (1956) "The Cell ll" (edit) (54:56)
61. The Ghost and Mrs. Muir (1947) "Thee Apparition" (edit) (56:15)
62. Vertigo (1958) "The Forest" (edit) (57:08)
63. Psycho (1960) "The Murder" (edit) (57:39)

PART FOUR: REMEMBRANCE OF THINGS PAST 

64. The Seventh Voyage of Sinbad (1958) "The Princess" (edit) (58:35)
65. North By Northwest (1959) "Interlude" (edit) (59:41)
66. The Battle of Neretva (1971) "Pastorale" (1:00:54)
67. Taxi Driver (1976) "I Still Can't Sleep" (edit) (1:02:52)
68. Hangover Square (1945) "Concerto Macabre for Piano and Orchestra" (edit) (1:03:44)
69. The Egyptian (1954) "Prelude/The Red Sea" (edit) (1:05:46)
70. Jane Eyre (1943) "Selections from the film" (edit) (1:07:45)
71. Obsession (1976) "Memorial Park" (edit) (1:08:38)
72. Citizen Kane (1941) "Snow Picture" (edit) (1:09:56)
73. The Kentuckian (1955) "Suite" (edit) (1:10:30)
74. Fahrenheit 451 (1966) "The Novel/David Copperfield" (edit) (1:11:33)
75. The Night Digger (1971) "Scene Seven" (edit) (1:12:48)
76. The Magnificent Ambersons (1942) "Ostinato" (edit) (1:13:25)
77. Garden of Evil (1954) "Night Scene" (edit) (1:14:54)
78. The Trouble with Harry (1955) "Tea Time" (edit) (1:15:59)
79. Walking Distance- episode from The Twilight Zone (1959) "Elegy" (edit) (1:17:36)
80. Citizen Kane (1941) "Rosebud/Final" (edit) (1:18:03)
81. Vertigo (1958) "Beauty Parlor" (1:20:40)

Attempting to count how many people identify as lesbian, gay, or bisexual (LGB) is a complicated prospect, and a new study shows that social stigma is a limiting factor regardless of how the questions are asked. Researchers at Ohio State and Boston Universities found that survey respondents were more likely to disclose aspects of a same-sex orientation when the questions were asked in a way to help hide the answers, and they were also more likely to reveal anti-gay sentiments.

The study juxtaposed responses to “Direct Report” questions (where participants had to directly answer questions) to “Veiled Report” questions (where participants answered questions as a group, thus “veiling” how they are answering the sensitive question) , then compared the averages between the two types of responses. The study was not a random sample, so it doesn’t provide any census-like conclusions about how many LGB people there are, but the comparison between direct and veiled responses shows just how difficult answering questions about LGB identities really is.

There are many ways to assess LGB identity, including whether people actually openly identify with a label such as “gay,” whether they’ve had same-sex attractions, and whether they’ve had any same-sex experiences. The study included a variety of these examples and found that with the extra privacy and anonymity of a veiled response, participants were more likely to disclose an LGB affiliation with each measure:

• In terms of whether they identify as not heterosexual, responses increased from 11 percent to 19 percent, a 65 percent increase.
• In terms of whether they have had a same-sex sexual experience, responses increased from 17 percent to 27 percent, a 59 percent increase.
• Same-sex attraction did not show as significant a difference, with responses only increasing from 14 percent to 15 percent, an 8 percent increase. This suggests that disclosing attractions is not as sensitive as disclosing behavior or identity.

The study found a similar effect when it came to disclosing anti-gay sentiment. When given the extra secrecy of a veiled response, more participants were willing to indicate opposition to LGBT equality, particularly in the workforce:

• In terms of whether they’d be unhappy to have an LGBT manager at work, responses increased from 16 percent to 27 percent, a 69 percent increase.
• In terms of whether they believe it should be legal to discriminate based on sexual orientation, responses increased from 14 percent to 25 percent, a 79 percent increase.

Veiled responses also prompted higher opposition to marriage equality and same-sex adoption, but in less significant ways. This suggests a type of Bradley Effect, which may explain past discrepancies between polling on same-sex marriage referenda and actual voting results.

One surprising response came to the question of whether respondents believe sexual orientation can be changed by choice. In the veiled report, fewer people suggested this was true, indicating that participants thought that it was more socially acceptable to indicate that sexual orientation can be changed. As the study concludes, this directly contradicts a general “pro-LGBT” norm, though it could also suggest that even those who claim to believe sexual orientation is just a choice don’t actually believe that it is.

A 2011 study by the Williams Institute estimated that about 3.5 percent of the population openly identify as LGB, but it pointed out that as many as 8.2 percent have engaged in same-sex sexual behavior, and as many as 11 percent acknowledge at least some same-sex sexual attraction. If the present study is any indication, all of these numbers are underestimates, suggesting there are many more people who fall under the non-heterosexual umbrella than can currently be assessed.



The post STUDY: Stigma Limits Self-Disclosure Of Gay Identities And Anti-Gay Attitudes appeared first on ThinkProgress.

Lady Gaga’s ‘unveiled’ the tracklisting for her new album ‘ARTPOP’ through the medium of a giant bloody mural.

“To announce the ARTPOP tracklist I’ve commissioned a mural by my most dedicated Los Angeles fans,” the ‘Christmas Tree’ hitmaker confirmed, before retweeting pictures of each of the song titles.

The final tracklisting was then shown in the completed mural, which looks a bit of a mess, frankly.

Anyway, here are the songs and the order she’d like us to listen to them in.

1. Aura

2. Venus

3. G.U.Y.

4. Sexxx Dreams

5. Jewels N’ Drugs feat T.I, Too $hort and Twista

6. MANiCURE

7. Do What U Want feat R Kelly << BLIMEY!

8. ARTPOP

9. Swine

10. Donatella

11. Fashion!

12. Mary Jane Holland

13. Dope

14. Gypsy

15. Applause

Gaga also used Instagram to share some more information about ‘Dope’, including the news that it was co-produced by Rick Rubin. Apparently it’s “the evolution of a fan song that became a deep confession in the recording studio”. (Hopefully this is just her way of saying it sounds like ‘Poker Face’.)

‘ARTPOP’ is out on November 11.

Serves 8
Total time: 1 hour || Active time: 30 minutes

This is what nightmares are made of! If nightmares were totally delicious. A grizzly green ghoul with haunted olive eyes, gaping radish fangs and ferocious claws…of thyme? Vegan food hasn’t been this scary since the 80s!

But beneath all the horror, this is a Lentil Mushroom Shepherd’s Pie With Scallion Cilantro Mashed Potatoes. Unfortunately, there’s nothing scary about that. So to name this macabre creation, I turned to the Post Punk Kitchen Facebook and ran a contest to find the perfect title. There were so many good ones, but come on…Monster Mash? That took the cake. Or took the potato, as it were. The winner will be receiving a signed copy of Isa Does It plus $25 to her favorite charity!

A few runner-up titles: Creature From The Black Legume, Mr. Potato Dead, Ghoul Interrupted, and Frankenthyme! Haha, good work, guys. Check back on Facebook soon for another Halloween recipe and your chance to win.

But for now, here we are: the perfect Halloween feast! DIG IN AT YOUR OWN RISK. And check out this video for a little extra guidance. (Watch with the sound on for the full effect.)

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Recipe Notes
~Hey, cilantro haters! You can totally replace that herb with some parsley or extra scallions, if you prefer.

~For extra decadence, replace the almond milk in the potatoes with cashew cream. Yum!

~I used white pepper in the potatoes so that you wouldn’t be able to see it. But if you don’t have any, black pepper is totally fine. Maybe your ghouls have freckles?

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Ingredients
For the mashed potato ghouls:
3 lbs russet potatoes, peeled and chopped into 1 1/2 inch chunks or so
2 cups chopped scallions, green parts only
1 cup fresh cilantro, including stems
1 cup unsweetened, plain almond milk (or your fave unsweetened non-dairy milk)
1/2 cup extra virgin olive oil
1 1/2 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon white pepper

For the lentil mushroom shepherd guts:
2 cups cold vegetable broth
1 tablespoon cornstarch
2 tablespoons tomato paste

2 tablespoons olive oil
1 yellow onion, medium dice
2 medium carrots, sliced into thin half moons
2 cloves garlic, minced

2 ribs celery, thinly sliced
1 lb cremini mushroom, chopped (about pea sized pieces)
3 tablespoons fresh thyme
Fresh black pepper
1 teaspoon salt (plus more, to taste)

4 cups cooked lentils
1 cup frozen peas

Accoutrement:
Pimento stuffed green olives
Radishes
Thyme sprigs

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Make the mashed potatoes:
Place potatoes in a large pot and submerge by an inch in cold water. Sprinkle about a teaspoon of salt into the water. Cover and bring to a boil. Once boiling, lower heat to a simmer and cook until very tender.

In the meantime, place scallions, cilantro and milk in a blender and puree until relatively smooth and bright ghoulish green!

Once potatoes are tender, drain them, then place immediately back in the pot. Do a preliminary mash with a potato masher, just to get them broken up. Add the oil and the blender mixture, salt and pepper and mash until very smooth. Taste for salt and pepper. Cover to keep warm until ready to serve.

Make the lentil layer:
In a measuring cup, mix together the broth and cornstarch until mostly dissolved. Mix in the tomato paste and set aside (we’ll use this to thicken later on.)

Preheat a large pan over medium heat. Sauté onion and carrots in oil with a pinch of salt for 5 to 7 minutes, until onions are lightly browned. Add garlic and sauté for 30 seconds or so, just until fragrant. Add mushrooms, celery, and thyme along with a bunch of fresh black pepper and 1 teaspoon salt. Let cook for about 5 minutes, until mushroom have released a lot of moisture. Add the cooked lentils and use your spatula to much them up a bit right in the pan. This creates a “ground beef” effect. :)

Add the cornstarch/broth mixture, and mix well. Let cook until gravy-like and thickened. Fold in the peas. Taste for salt and seasoning.

To assemble:
Now comes the fun part! Slice olive into 1/8 inch thick “eyes.” The ends will need to be a separate snack, since you’ll just want to use the pieces with pimento in the center.

Slice radishes into 1/8th inch thick discs, and slice those discs into halfmoons. Then use a paring knife to carve out triangles for teeth. Have fun with it! Don’t worry about perfection here. (View video above for reference)

Strip thyme sprigs of their leaves until reaching their “claws.”

Have ready a large freezer bag with a 3/4 inch hole sliced out of the corner. Fill bag with some ghoulish mashed potatoes. This works best if they’re still warm!

Now fill individual bowls with shepherd guts. Take your mashed potato bag and squeeze ghouls into existence right onto each bowl of guts.

Place sliced olives into its eye sockets. Postition radishes for mouths. Position into mouth. Attach stems to the ghoul's arm sockets. It's alive! Ahh!

On Tuesday, Obamacare’s state-level insurance marketplaces opened to the public, marking the start of a six-month enrollment period that will stretch into March. Although there’s been some confusion around the health law’s new marketplaces — also known as “exchanges” — initial reports suggest that a significant number of people are seeking out information about reform. States across the country are overwhelmed with huge amounts of traffic to their new exchange websites.

Here are some of the early details about Obama enrollment emerging on a state and national level (this post will be updated as the day continues):

National website: A senior Obama administration official reported that just three hours after Obamacare’s open enrollment period launched, the national Healthcare.gov site had one million visitors. That’s five times more users on the site than the number of users who have ever visited Medicare.gov at the same time. At about 3:45 pm, the White House’s deputy press secretary reported that up to 2.8 million people had visited the site since its launch, and 81,000 people had called the federal hotline to get information about Obamacare.

California: The Golden State celebrated its first Obamacare enrollee at 8:45 am Pacific Standard Time. Since then, state residents have tweeted that they’re “impressed” with how easy it is to use the exchange’s app, and the site is “working like a charm for Californians.” The officials running the exchange say the site is getting 10,00 hits every second.

Colorado: In Colorado, the exchange site opened for business at 8:00 am Mountain Standard Time. Three hours later, state officials had completed the first enrollments and the site had logged over 34,500 unique visitors. During the first half of the day, 1,300 Colorado residents created accounts on the site. Creating an account is the first step for people who want to shop for coverage and eventually buy a new plan under Obamacare.

Connecticut: Despite a few initial glitches with its website, Connecticut signed up its first Obamacare enrollee by 9:30 am. And at that point, 764 other people had active applications for the state’s exchange. “For a site that’s been up for 25 minutes, it’s not bad,” the CEO of Connecticut’s new insurance marketplace, Kevin Counihan, noted. By about 11:30 am, the state had logged 10,000 visitors to its website. By about 2:00 pm, state officials reported that they had fielded 17,000 phone calls from residents and enrolled 44 people for coverage.

District of Columbia: DC’s exchange opened for business at 8:00 am. By noon, about 1,500 DC residents had created accounts on the exchange site, according to a spokesperson for the exchange. The District hasn’t yet experienced any issues with its website.

Florida: MSNBC reports that community health care clinics in Orlando are experiencing long lines as low-income people are visiting to learn more about their options under Obamacare. The CEO of a community clinic in Miami that primarily services uninsured Floridians told MSNBC that Tuesday represents a “new day” for low-income patients who can now gain affordable coverage.

Illinois: By noon on Tuesday, more than 42,000 people had visited the website for Illinois’ exchange.

Kentucky: Kentucky is the only Southern state that’s chosen to participate fully in health care reform by both expanding Medicaid and operating a state-level exchange. So far, it’s paying off. Between midnight and 10:30 am on Tuesday, Kentucky’s website had more than 24,000 visitors. The employees working to manage the exchange processed more than 1,000 applications for health insurance by 9:30 am. By the afternoon, nearly 2,000 people had applied for coverage.

Nevada: As of 10:00 am Pacific Standard Time, 770 different people had created accounts to shop for plans on Nevada’s exchange. State officials had already fielded 492 calls from residents at that point. By 11 am, those numbers had risen to 1,236 accounts and 758 calls.

New York: In the first two hours that New York’s exchange website was open to the public, 2 million people visited the site. That’s a huge chunk of the population that stands to benefit from Obamacare. Approximately 2.6 million New York residents are currently uninsured, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation.

Rhode Island: After Kaiser Health News solicited feedback from people trying to sign up for Obamacare, a Rhode Island resident responded with a positive experience. “Rhode Island site working fine. So many choices at so many price points! Something 4 everyone. I’m ecstatic,” Annabelle Leigh tweeted.

Virginia: Paula Thornhill, a 31-year-old mother of seven, was the first person to apply for a new plan in Prince George’s County. Her husband has health insurance through his job, but they couldn’t afford to pay the extra premium costs to cover her as well. “I’m relieved that they did come out with this affordable health care,” she told the Washington Post. “I’m relieved.”

Some people trying to log onto their state’s website are experiencing glitches and delays. Some of that is a result of the high traffic that the sites are currently getting; other instances represent technical issues that will have to be resolved moving forward. “We have built a dynamic system and are prepared to make adjustments as needed and improve the consumer experience,” a spokeswoman from the Department of Health and Human Services said in a statement.

The Obama administration is advising Americans who are experiencing issues to contact the federal call center or use the help section of the federal Healthcare.gov site to find someone who can assist them. Americans can also still sign up by using a paper application.

The post Obamacare Enrollment Is Beating Expectations appeared first on ThinkProgress.

There is little to no argument that Tom Waits is one of the longest standing bullshitters in the history of popular music. As such, upon the release of his 1999 Mule Variations lp, he graced television screens everywhere appearing on an episode of VH1 Storytellers. With his gruff voice and a cherry-picked ad hoc band […]

The lengths of the songs on Justin Timberberlake’s ‘The 20/20 Experience 2/2′ album have been ‘unveiled’ and it’s bad news for people who enjoy their pop songs under 4 minutes long.

As you can see the shortest song is 4:32 and the closing (and surely ironically titled) ‘Not A Bad Thing’ goes on for 11 minutes and 28 fucking seconds.

:(

Here they are in all their ‘glory’:

Gimme What I Don’t Know (I Want) 05:15
True Blood 09:31
Cabaret 04:32
TKO 07:04
Take Back The Night 05:55
Murder 05:07
Drink You Away 05:31
You Got It On 05:55
Amnesia 07:04
Only When I Walk Away 07:05
Not A Bad Thing 11:28

Around 9:10 p.m. at 140 Tremont St., according to Brian D'Amico, who adds the homicide unit was summoned because of the severity of the injuries.

This is what Juno Temple‘s Repulsion looks like. It is an anus.

There’s no cramped apartment, but there’s a moldy pueblo in Chile, instead of trauma flashbacks we’ve got intense animal noises underscored by incessant ambient bologna, and a “twist” ending that must be seen to be COMPLETELY UNBELIEVED.

Also: endure great unease due to inventive direction, see Michael Cera successfully play against type and Catalina Sandino Moreno (a.k.a. Maria Full of Drugs) play an enormous bitch, discover psychosexual situations galore and laugh MANY times at unintentionally hilarious, gratuitous shock.

It is both wonderful and terrible. There’s a lot to love in Magic Magic (from out director Sebastian Silva) and a lot to hate, like all treasures. You’ll dislike it “as a movie” because of all its pieces that fumble about, but know that this is an EXPERIENCE. As only fitting for a journey, here is your GUIDE.
And yes…

You should GO, GO, GO, GO WATCH MAGIC MAGIC RIGHT NOW ON VOD (i.e. Amazon) AND THEN REPORT BACK HERE AND HEED OUR WORDS.

AHEAD SPOILERS AHEAD SPOILERS AHEAD SPOILERS AHEAD SPOILERS

“GUESS WHO” IS PLAYED IN THIS MOVIE AND NO THIS IS NOT 1987

For those who haven’t seen but choose to read ahead: It’s a thriller-horror-psychosexual downfall set “in a little village” at the home of Augustin, his asshole sister Barbara, and their sociopath friend Brink. Augustin’s girlfriend Sarah comes to hang out, bringing her anxious American friend Alicia — our hero. We see all the fucked up shit through Alicia’s POV.

Essentially it’s a hodge-podge of upsets and a girl’s inability to understand it. So, it is A FEAST.

FIRST: THE BAD SHIT YOU HAVE TO ENDURE.

A SNAIL’S PACE.

Come ooonnnnnn….! Come on come on come on. Shave off the birdhunts, repetitive insomnia, dogs that hump or attack Juno, overlong breakfast scenes (do we really need to watch everyone amble their way to the table?) and GET TO THE MEAT OF THE FILM.

SO MUCH SLOW IMAGERY THAT IS NEITHER USEFUL NOR SYMBOLIC.

In conjunction with the snail’s pace. You could NOT have more shots of immobile sheep. Vague horizons and swirling clouds may painfully remind you of The Happening very early on. What’s insanely fun about downspiral-paranoia psychological thrillers are the A/V mind tricks that writers and directors occasionally pepper in to make us feel as insane as our hero (think Exorcist‘s devil face or Black Swan‘s everything). But, I mean, there is a LIMIT. I am not threatened by images of unattended horses or swaying weeds.

“THERE IS NO CELL RECEPTION HERE.”

Said, to camera, by Maria Full of Drugs. Thank you, Maria Full of Drugs.

Browning’s kitty tongue.

EMILY BROWNING.

EEEEE! This little tapeworm. We love her, but she’s used so poorly here as a convenient friend who at times is dependable but at (most) other times is an enemy/cunt. It’s confusing how to feel about her. The performance just comes across as lazy. It’s as if she was on set for four days, half-heartedly did whatever Silva said, and peaced.

Her worst: The Uninvited, an embarrassing American remake of A Tale of Two Sisters that pits her against the hysterically miscast Elizabeth Banks who is, literally, a pearls-clutching villain!
Her best: Series of Unfortunate Events, our favorite early post-Y2K studio-horror turds Ghost Ship and Darkness Falls, and lest we forget her compelling role of BABYDOLL in SUCKER PUNCH?

EMILY BROWNING LEAVES CHILE FOR 2 DAYS FOR AN UNRELATED ABORTION.

Did it hurt? It was my baby, too!

THE ENTIRE ENDING.

How dare they! We spend one-hundred minutes watching the highs and lows of privileged blonde vacation life with exciting hints at terror to come, only to be treated to, in our slack-jawed upset, PEOPLE IN (KINDA RACIST) TRIBAL GARB inexplicably chanting VOODOO and shaking tamborines around a SUDDENLY DYING JUNO over a FIREPIT (!) while the other young castmembers sob in confusion and say “what’s going on”? Nauseating, to say the least. It was so sudden and unintentionally hilarious like entirety of Nicolas Cage’s Wicker Man.

Sippy cup full of anti-possession liquid.

BUT THEN: THE TRULY GREAT.

JUNO (NOTES ON A SCANDALOUS) TEMPLE.

I’ll just get this out of the way before I explode. Selina Kyle’s butch sidekick, the one in the Artful Dodger rags, excels here. Impishness, naive courtesy, and realistic and irrepressible anxiety ALL in the same beat. You believe she’s a sheltered victim-pixie who can’t help but cry after not sleeping for twenty-four hours, and feel terrible that you sympathize with this creature. It’s lovely.

MICHAEL CERA.

Not only does he make a convincing sociopath, but he is intentionally hysterical. His emotional outbursts are disgusting and great, and he wears Christmas sweaters AND a giant fur. He is a genuine, annoying person you’ve met or worked with or been forced to socialize with. If this movie wasn’t kinda forgettable, his performance would be squawked about by all the usual fags.

CATALINA SANDINO MORENO FINALLY PLAYING A BITCH!

You can only pretend to watch Fast Food Nation so many times before you start asking, can she be cast in any role other than a crying young mother or something? And here, SHE DOES. And she is a SCENE-CHEWER. Her character, “BARBARA,” is always vaguely “studying.” Also, at one point she calls Juno a “gringa.”

THE DIRECTOR’S BROTHER, ACTOR AUGUSTIN SILVA.

He serves three purposes and three purposes only – tall, olive, bearded. His beady eyes convey a broken past and a mumblecore future. And a heavy penis.

HIS HEALTHY MORNING TALLYWACKER.

Exhibit Boner:

JUNO’S FUCKING RIDICULOUS SEXY TRANCE-DANCE NUMBER!

Set to The Knife’s “Pass This On.”

MUSIC, CINEMATOGRAPHY, SOUND DESIGN, AND TANTALIZING OPENING CREDITS.

As awful as the hazy-cloudy-Happening shots are, the original score is melodic and hypnotic. That is, for the first two minutes, before it fades into ambient sludge. The sound design is excellent too, as specific as the scratching of Juno’s cheek against her skritchy skratchy wool sweater, onto which she cries and snots. The D.P. Christopher Doyle treats our eyeballs pleasantly.

AND WHY THIS VIEWING IS A GOOD CHOICE:

IN CONCLUSION.

I mean, really. What makes a “bad” movie? This is one in which Juno Temple rubs her pussy on Michael Cera’s face while he is sleeping. It is also somehow produced by Mike White. Aside from shit we have to wade through, it is entertaining and the smallest bit worthy. SEE IT.

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Music’s great isn’t it? Well not all of it – some of it’s shit. But there’s an album of great music out today and, like a lot of great pop music, it runs the risk of falling through the cracks in the pop pavement when really it should be blasting out of military-grade loudspeakers on every street corner.

As it happens, the album in question is the direct result of its creator spending the last decade falling through cracks. It’s third reinvention lucky for an artist who has already lived two pop lifetimes, which is to say she’s been signed (and dropped) by not one but two major labels over the last ten years.

For each phase of her career, she’s shifted her look and sound. First she was a UK R&B artist, and she was pretty good. It didn’t quite work. Then she championed a strange but interesting pop-doo-wop sound. That didn’t really work either. Last year, under her own steam, she started putting out music again, changing direction for a second time. There was, apparently, an album ready to go, but ten months ago she pulled the plug on the whole thing. It wasn’t right, she said. And then she sort of disappeared. She went away, and she made the album that is released today.

Some people seem to have found this constant genre-hopping slightly disingenuous, as if this transparently motivated singer songwriter is just crossing off musical styles on a list until one of them finally brings her success. It’s strange how some pop artists are applauded for being queens of reinvention while others are labelled desperate. Anyway, the album that’s out today doesn’t seem desperate. If anything it just underlines this artist’s versatility. And yes, she may be hoping for success – her interviews, tweets and songs burst with ambition. But at the same time, quite right too. How many decent popstars truly lack ambition? We can think of two.

Anyway, after all the ups and downs and further downs associated with going through the major label mangle twice, it’s brilliant that the plaudits that will surely come for this new album will be hers, and hers alone, to absorb. She’s releasing it on her own label, too. How great must that feel. You spend a decade ricocheting between major label A&Rs, product managers, publicists, pluggers and all the rest. All these people who are doing their best with music that isn’t quite right for whatever the public, or the radio and TV people who stand between you and the public, are looking for at that point in pop history. So you and the people you’re working with start bending over backwards to make people happy, and it doesn’t really work, and it’s all pretty shit. And then you piss off and do something by yourself and it’s brilliant. Really brilliant.

About three years ago, when her second attempt at chart success had gone tits up and the singer was trapped in the kind of post-deal netherworld from which few popstars tend to escape, members of various music forums (including the Popjustice one) took the piss out of her when she posted a video talking about ‘development’. They made a gif of her spelling the word de-vel-op-ment. It probably seemed quite funny to a handful of people and the video was, to be fair, pretty terrible. With hindsight she was probably having some sort of breakdown, artistically at least. But in 2013, she’s vindicated. The development, now complete, was extraordinary, and necessary.

Often when artists are dropped they limp ahead trying to extend a career that’s already failing. It’s like they’re fixing the roof of a collapsing house. You’ll see them talking a lot about the freedom they now have. Actually, very often, they’re not making the most of that freedom. The music they’re making isn’t that different from what they did before – they’re just trying to do it on a budget. So when they talk about their freedom they’re actually still trapped by the decisions that were made when they were at their former label.

But here’s an album that revels in the fact that, actually, nobody was really waiting for it. Away from the pressure of expectation, this artist has made an album that far exceeds the promise of her earlier attempts. It’s a big album. The melodies are huge. The production – electronic, dark, enveloping – is exquisite. The vocals are extraordinary. Lyrically there’s immense power and depth.  It’s an album that creates its own world, insular and at times claustrophobic, but large parts of it are brilliantly accessible. It feels like the perfect companion piece to Siobhan Donaghy’s ‘Ghosts’, another album made by someone who had to hit the bottom in order to discover the true extent of her creativity.

To start with, we didn’t really get what the artist was trying to do with this project. There was a single a few months ago which didn’t make much sense at the time and we thought, well, we liked her in her first incarnation, we liked her again in her second incarnation, the third one that didn’t come out didn’t really appeal and this new one seems a bit weird, so maybe after ten years it’s time to give this act a swerve. But when you like an artist you’ll always give them one more chance, so when she put out the second single a month or so ago, we gave it a click anyway, and it was brilliant. Now, in the context of the whole album, that first song we didn’t really understand makes complete sense.

Don’t expect to see this album in the midweek Top 10 tomorrow. But do expect to see people talking about it over the coming months, and do expect to fall in love with it yourself. People will, eventually, go properly mental for this album. Reviews have been great so far. The album will still be picking up fans a year from now. It feels like an important album but, most importantly, it’s just really great to listen to.

It’s called ‘Samson & Delilah’, it’s by V V Brown, it’s £7.99 and you can buy it here.

QBLA is on a powerful mission to invade hip hop and transform its underground trajectory.

Southern California’s William Rosario has quite a few tricks in his audio arsenal. Having produced under the Asymmetrical Head moniker for several years by instilling an astute path of exp-electronic distortions, he’s (recently) unleashed the QBLA project which incorporates a more laid-back hip-hop approach. This can’t be an easy switch for any artist as they try to separate their musical identity, style and execution. QBLA seems to have no issue.

From erratic yet somehow uniform entanglements as Asymmetrical Head to a wide assortment of samples, instruments and downtempo foundations as QBLA, Architects + Heroes evolves into a multifaceted platform for musicians to expand their sonic missions. The album title immediately recalls Guns ‘N Roses’ most recognized commercial track of the late 80s, but this production is so far removed from anything remotely rock ‘n roll that it’s not even worth examining.

Broken shards of bass shimmy their way through crisp percussion and a minimal tone takes shapes throughout these short outings. Elements of early Deceptikon and Prefuse 73 are strewn throughout, however, QBLA emits his own particular funk especially evident on the 70s-inspired rhythmic tone and vocodered lyrical treatment of “Schmoove.” Reggae blasts and a low-frequency vocal oscillation are transmitted via “The Man With The Asteroid Belt” as “Rainbow In Brooklyn” flourishes in microscopic ambient layers tethered to chilled electrical constructs. “Merman” falls away into more guitar influenced soundtrack perspectives—laid back with a twangy flow and slow-motion delivery. A reversed loop is manipulated with perfection on the disjointedly creative “I Don’t Have A Running Crew” leaving QBLA on a powerful mission to invade hip hop and transform its underground trajectory. Closing up with an eerily contagious percussive curve on “Miranda Inst.” and Where The Girls Are Green and the Grass Is Pretty leaves the listener in anticipation for what’s next.

Where The Girls Are Green and the Grass Is Pretty is available on Architects + Heroes.

Popjustice reader Mal Nicholson has been in touch, sending over a video of Margaret Berger performing at Stockholm Pride a couple of weeks ago.

As you will be well aware, Bergo’s 2013 Eurovision entry ‘I Feed You My Love’ was one of the best songs in the whole Contest and this new live version shoves a big old rocket up its arse.

(The vocal performance is, sadly, ‘a little on the iffy side’, but what can you do.)

“Let’s hope this is a bonus mix on the forthcoming album,” Mal notes in his email. Yes Mal, let’s cross our fingers. Actually, the more we think about it, the upcoming Margaret Berger album is probably going to be the best album of whichever year it’s released in, isn’t it?

Here is the artwork for her upcoming single, ‘Human Race’, which is due out in PRECISELY SEVEN DAYS.

Brilliant.

Sometimes, more upsettingly, it’s even possible to lose faith in pop.

So it is somewhat cheering that 4099 visitors to Britney Spears’ Facebook page have clicked ‘like’ on a black rectangle.

The hope of these 4099 people – it’s actually gone up to 4121 since we did that screengrab three minutes ago – and of all right-minded pop citizens is that the black image on Britney’s Facebook, and the black header and background on Britney’s Twitter…

…and a similar black image on her Google+ page (but we’re not going to screengrab that because frankly who cares) all amount to a sort of social media blackout. And what these 4121 people (it’s 4123 now) really hope is that the blackout is a reference to the fact that something is about to happen. Specifically, the 4123 people (it’s 4127 now) hope that the thing about to happen is Britney’s new album being Blackout 2.0 in name, or in spirit, or in every way possible.

Imagine that.

Britney’s best album except for the second one and maybe the third one, but not in 2007, and not when she’s having a bit of a wobble that adds to the ‘narrative’ but makes you feel a bit guilty about liking it as much as you do. Britney’s best(ish) album in 2013.

It could happen.

Bonus!

We’ve put together a special Blackout 2.0 desktop wallpaper. Click the image below to download it.

Bonus 2!

As requested by one Popjustice reader, here’s the beautiful wallpaper redesigned for widescreen monitors.

Update, August 30: The figure is now 4435.

Britney Spears is counting down to something on her website but don’t hit the POP EMERGENCY button quite yet because you’ve got 28 days to gather your belongings, bid farewell to your loved ones, retrieve your fake passport and bundle of cash from the secret box etc etc.

Well, we say 28 days, you’ve probably got about 23 days until whatever it is starts leaking, first in low quality snippets then in slightly longer portions until eventually Britney’s team feel it necessary to bring forward the radio premiere, thus slightly derailing a well-thought-through campaign.

(If this is a countdown to the first of seven teaser videos we will not be happy and if it’s a new fragrance we will be furious.)

The literary world has lost a giant with word that iconic crime novelist Elmore Leonard has passed away in a Detroit area hospital from complications of a stroke suffered last month. The author of Jackie Brown, Get Shorty, 3:10 To Yuma and scores of others, Leonard was idolized in both literary and film circles for his crackling dialogue and hard boiled characters. Leonard was 87....

[Read the whole post on twitchfilm.com...]

The Toronto International Film Festival just announced their lineup of Special Presentations for this year. I’m very pleased to report that two films I worked on, The Disappearance of Eleanor Rigby and Don Jon are on the list!

I composed the music for Disappearance, which is actually a double-feature. It’s my first feature film score. The movie, starring Jessica Chastain and James McAvoy, is two unique films that tell the same story, but from different perspectives (“Him” and “Her”). The films work independently of one another, and can play in either order. I did some really geeky things with the score, which I’ll write about later.

Don Jon was scored by Nathan Johnson, but I got to help him a bit by making synths and beats and co-writing a banger for a few club scenes. Nathan and I worked together extensively on his score for last year’s Looper. Don Jon is Joseph Gordon-Levitt’s directorial debut, and stars Scarlett Johansson, Tony Danza, Julianne Moore and Joe.

If homeless people in Tampa want to avoid jail, they’d better find a place to store their things and a bed to sleep in.

That’s because last week, the Tampa City Council passed a new ordinance, Item #60, allowing police officers to arrest someone they see sleeping in public or “storing personal property in public.” The vote was 4-3.

Advocates are outraged over this new law criminalizing homelessness. Holding signs reading “Sleeping Is Not A Crime” and “Homelessness Is Not A Choice,” many demonstrated outside the Council and testified against the measure, to little avail. A number of the protesters were elementary school children who handed out flyers and asked those passing by, “Where are they supposed to go?”

Homelessness is a major, pervasive issue in Tampa. A 2012 study found that, among mid-sized cities, Tampa and the surrounding area had the highest number of homeless individuals at 7,419.

Exacerbating the problem is the lack of affordable homeless shelters, much less affordable permanent housing. “Most shelters in the Tampa Bay area charge $10 to $42 per night for a single person. They aren’t free,” Tasha Rennels, a Ph.D. student at University of South Florida, told Bay News 9. Though the City Council acknowledged that shelters in the city are full almost every night, they didn’t include any additional funding for new shelters or housing to go along with Item #60.

Tampa isn’t the only city taking on new anti-homeless measures. Last week, a Miami City Commissioner began an effort to throw homeless people in jail who were caught engaging in life-sustaining activities in public, such as eating and sleeping.

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for July 16, 2013 is:

booboisie • \boob-wah-ZEE\  • noun
: the general public regarded as consisting of boobs

Examples:
"'Elitism' was always the sneer of the booboisie against opera…." — From an article by Stephanie Von Buchau in Opera News, July 1998

"[Simon] Doonan's silliness is a delight. This is not a rote throwback to the 'Queer Eye for the Straight Guy' advice of yore. There's no dumbing down for the booboisie." — From a book review by Christopher Muther in the Boston Globe, January 7, 2012

Did you know?
Journalist and critic H. L. Mencken is often credited with coining "booboisie," a blend of "boob," as it refers to someone who cares too much about things and too little about ideas and art, and "bourgeoisie," that French-origin term for the middle class. Mencken may have indeed coined the word, but it seems likely that he wasn't the word's only inventor. According to the 2006 Yale Book of Quotations, Mencken was quoted using "booboisie" in an August 1922 issue of The Dial before it appeared in any of his writings. But a February 22, 1922 Washington Post article opens with the following line: "A plot to mulct the 'booboisie' which might have been invented by an author of get-rich-quick fiction …." The booboisie, of course, couldn't care less.

When label curator Ian Hawgood was sounded out by electroacoustic nomad Wren a couple of years ago about releasing his latest opus, it meant fulfillment of a long-cherished desire to expand his remit into film alongside music.

Word from Home Normal of the arrival of Book of the Folded Forest, tied in with a headlining performance of Orla Wren‘s latest work at the imminent HomeNormalism festival. When label curator Ian Hawgood was sounded out by electroacoustic nomad Wren a couple of years ago about releasing his latest opus, it meant fulfillment of a long-cherished desire to expand his remit into film alongside music. His heart had been captured by the ‘tender organically produced electronic sounding music’ of The One Two Bird and The Half Horse (flau, 2009), and, for Hawgood, Wren was evidently The One. Book of the Folded Forest evolved into a project with a common collaborator, Urban9, who worked previously on Nicolas Bernier‘s Home Normal releases, as well as Hawgood’s own Enfants Ruraux. The label landlord decided ‘this would be the project to really play with the packaging and presentation, seeing just how far we could go.’

It presents in an 8-panel CD and DVD package, with unique Urban9-designed postcards and a large 175gsm uncoated poster, and features seven films by awarding-winning directors—Lumacell, Joey Bania, The New Honeyshade, Tippi Tillvind, Elise Baldwin, and Skinofthetree. The music is haunting and beautiful, tender fragmented vocals softly swooning over subtle melodic layers, attended by kindred spirits Danny Norbury, Aaron Martin, Paddy Mann, Jessica Constable, Eva Puyuelo, Keiron Phelan, Katie English, Lori Scacco, Joanna Joachim, Frederic Oberland, Barry Leake, Heidi Elva, and Cyril Secq.

Book of the Folded Forest is due for release in August (2013) on Home Normal. [Release page]

Social conservatives came out in full force on NBC’s Meet The Press on the Sunday after the Supreme Court struck down the Defense of Marriage Act. Former Sen. Jim DeMint (R-SC) of the Heritage Foundation and Rep. Tim Huelskamp (R-KS) both claimed the court’s decision to recognize same-sex marriages sacrificed children’s wellbeing — only to have their arguments promptly slapped down by MSNBC hosts Rachel Maddow and David Gregory.

DeMint said the court had privileged “the desires of adults” over “the best environment for children,” arguing that heterosexual marriage is “the environment where children can thrive and succeed.” Maddow immediately pointed out that this argument ignores the children of same-sex couples, who have up til now been treated as second-class citizens under the law:

Justice Kennedy addressed that issue specifically in his ruling. He says that by denying marriage rights to same-sex couples who have kids, you’re humiliating and demeaning those kids. By denying their families equal protection under the law by the parents who are raising them and who love them and who make their family. So we can put it in the interests of children, but I think that cuts both ways. And the ruling cuts against that argument. I mean, gay people exist. There’s nothing we can do in public policy can do to make more of us exist or less of us exist. And you guys for a generation have argued that public policy ought to demean gay people as a way of expressing disapproval of the fact that we exist. But you don’t make any less of us exist, you are just arguing for more discrimination. And more discrimination doesn’t make straight people’s lives any better.

Watch it:

Later in the program, Huelskamp tried to justify his introduction of a constitutional amendment to ban same-sex marriage by touting debunked research that supposedly shows heterosexual parents are better for kids. Gregory challenged the congressman, insisting that he admit the research is bogus:

HUELSKAMP: As Senator DeMint did note, the research is very clear that the ideal way of raising our children should be the issue here, and that’s what we need to focus on in this debate.

GREGORY: Wait, but Justice Kennedy speaks to this. There’s also research that indicates that…you know, everyone talks about the interests of children. Children tend to prosper in homes where there is a loving marriage. There is really not evidence to suggest that if you are a same-sex couple or a heterosexual couple that it makes one difference one way or the other.

HUELSKAMP: Well actually the research does not show that, actually the research is very clear as we have indicated here, but –

GREGORY: No, no. Everybody throws that out, but the research actually shows that in broken homes, it hurts the children. Which I think most people would say that would be true of same-sex couples or heterosexual couples. We don’t really know, do we? But we do have a sense that loving marriages provide a good family life for children, right?

Watch it:

Huelskamp ducked the debunk and again claimed that “the court decided the desires of adults should trump the needs of children.” Nevertheless, Gregory is correct that the research cited by marriage equality opponents actually has nothing to do with same-sex couples. In fact, the largest study of families with same-sex parents recently concluded these children are not only thriving, but even beat the national average for overall health and family cohesion.

The Czech poster for Robert Bresson’s Une femme douce by Olga Poláčková-Vyleťalová is one of my favorite posters of all-time: an extraordinarily arresting, beautifully executed piece of Czech surrealism that yet has a strong thematic and visual connection to the film itself. (The girl wrapped in her own hair could be the isolated and suicidal character played by Dominique Sanda.) So I was taken aback when a friend pointed out this photograph recently.

The photograph is apparently by the great fashion and celebrity photographer Bert Stern, who passed away on Wednesday at the age of 83. Stern, who was the subject of the documentary Bert Stern: Original Mad Man that was released earlier this year, is best known for his hundreds of photographs of Marilyn Monroe taken weeks before her death. But his most famous connection to movie posters is that he took the photographs of Sue Lyons wearing heart-shaped sunglasses on the set of Stanley Kubrick’s Lolita that became the iconic poster for the film. (Stern had first met Kubrick while he was a mailroom boy at Look Magazine and Kubrick was a staff photographer.) Stern also co-directed the music documentary Jazz on a Summer’s Day which was released in 1960.

I have no idea where the Stern photograph came from or where it was used, nor do I definitively know whether the photograph or the poster came first. This webpage dates the photograph as 1969 while the poster is dated 1970, and it would seem more likely that a painting could be made from a photograph than that Stern’s art department could recreate a turquoise and diamond choker drawn from imagination. (Also that webpage credits Cartier as the designer of the choker.) None of which is to take anything away from Poláčková-Vyleťalová; Czech posters have a tradition of borrowing elements and making them their own and the throughline and interplay between New York fashion photography, French cinema and Czech graphic design is fascinating. The image, which if nothing else is gorgeously rendered, fits not only the film, but also fits into her own oeuvre, as is clear below. Appropriation of western fashion photography seems to have been a strong part of her aesthetic.

Born in 1944, Poláčková-Vyleťalová designed a total of 76 posters between 1969 and 1989, and the hair-centric designs above are only a sample of her wide-ranging work, much of which you can see on the indispensable Czech movie poster site Terry Posters.

Meanwhile, while we’re on the subject of influences, it is clear that this poster for Athina Rachel Tsangari’s The Capsule—one of my favorite posters of last year—owes a great deal to both Poláčková-Vyleťalová and Stern.

Or maybe Bert Stern, in taking the original photo in 1969, was thinking of this 1964 Polish poster by Franciszek Starowieyski.

Posters courtesy of Posteritati and Terry Posters, and thanks to Daga Samitowska Oh for joining the dots.

Iconic science fiction and horror writer Richard Matheson has passed away at age 87. The author of I Am Legend, Matheson also wrote numerous episodes of The Twilight Zone, The Alfred Hitchcock Hour, Night Gallery, The Martian Chronicles and Amazing Stories as well as stories that would be adapted to big screen fare such as Steven Spielberg's Duel, The Incredible Shrinking Man and What Dreams May Come. An absolute titan in the world of speculative fiction, Matheson's passing leaves a large hole and he will most certainly be missed. For more on why Matheson matters - or just to stroll back through some memories - check out Fernando Toste's list of Ten Matheson Essentials here....

[Read the whole post on twitchfilm.com...]

As the House of Representatives prepares on Tuesday to consider huge legislative restrictions on a woman’s right to choose, one GOP congressman is using the idea that fetuses can masturbate to argue for more abortion restrictions.

On Monday evening, Rep. Michael Burgess (R-TX), an Ob/Gyn by trade, told his colleagues to, “Watch a sonogram of a 15-week baby, and they have movements that are purposeful”:

They stroke their face. If they’re a male baby, they may have their hand between their legs. If they feel pleasure, why is it so hard to believe that they could feel pain?

The House’s bill uses the scientifically disputed idea that a fetus can feel pain after 20 weeks as the basis for effectively ban all abortions after that time. Several state legislatures have passed similar bans, though just last month an appeals court struck down a ‘fetal pain’ bill in Arizona, finding that the law was unconstitutional under Roe v. Wade.

Peter Strickland’s British horror deconstruction Berberian Sound Studio opened yesterday in a crowded field of fifteen new releases, but if graphic design was all it took to get people into theaters BSS should be way ahead of the field. The startling grayscale collage of the US one sheet was designed by the suddenly prolific Brandon Schaefer who, as IFC Films’ new house designer, has designed two of my other favorite posters of the year so far, for Simon Killer and Gimme the Loot. He has also started giving me a run for my money writing about movie posters for Film.com. I particularly like his introduction about his personal design education, his process piece about Simon Killer, and his rant against the facile nature of fan art minimalism (though I do think there he omits giving praise where praise is occasionally due).

Berberian Sound Studio is a mysterious and atmospheric thriller about a meek English sound engineer named Gilderoy who is thrust into a nightmare of Italian machismo, giallio violence and bureaucratic indifference when he is hired to work on a “thrilling all’italiana” in Rome. Well out of his comfort zone of bucolic home counties nature docs, Gilderoy is required to record sound effects, mostly created with a fecund array of fruit and veg, for skull-splittings, red-hot-poker-rape and script directions such as “the dangerously aroused goblin is stalking the dormitory.” Daniel Kasman wrote most perceptively about the film in these pages when it played in the New York Film Festival last year.

Schaefer’s poster nods to Strickland’s, and Gilderoy’s, obsession with recording equipment. Shot by Nic Knowland who has shot both of the Quay Brothers’ features (it is also co-produced by the Quays’ producer Keith Griffiths), the film is a masterpiece of macro photography, full of close-ups of switches and knobs and reels. The poster also conveys the schizophrenic terror of Gilderoy’s gradual unraveling. 

The UK quad eschews the equipment and focusses on Gilderoy’s mental schism, but the official release poster only tells half the story.

The UK campaign was designed by Julian House, a brilliant graphic designer, filmmaker and musician who was part of Berberian Sound Studio from its inception. He designed the 70s-era tape boxes seen within the film and, most notably, created—and even came up with the idea for—the superb fake credit sequence for The Equestrian Vortex, the film that Gilderoy is working on. You can watch it here, but I’d highly recommend seeing it in the context of the film first.

Not long after the release of the film in the UK last year, a number of House’s dazzling alternative designs for the film’s poster were leaked, all of them, even more so than the official poster, in House’s very recognizable collage style combining extreme halftones, splashes of blood, torn snatches of package design, concentric circles, tape reels and a ravishing duotone color palette. It was these designs above all which inspired me to write about Berberian in time for its US release.

House is also co-owner of Ghost Box—“a record label for a group of artists exploring the musical history of a parallel world”—for whom he also records as The Focus Group as well as designs all the Penguin-inspired packaging.

He has also designed album covers for, among others, Stereolab, Oasis and his close friends Broadcast who scored Berberian Sound Studio and of which he is an occasional member. (His website states “as unofficial band member he reflected their shared interests in the imagery he created for them: esoteric pop-psych, European film soundtracks, underground film and ancient electronics.”) His recent cover for the Can anthology The Lost Tapes seems to feed directly from his work on Berberian.

And one last piece: a few years ago I included the British quad for Lynne Ramsay’s Morvern Callar among my top ten movie posters of the last decade. I’m pleased to discover belatedly that this was also designed by House.

You can see much more of Julian House’s work on the Intro website and more of Brandon Schaefer’s work on his Seek and Speak blog. Since it fits very nicely into the aesthetic of all the above, I just want to close with Schaefer’s unused 2012 design for the UK re-release of Whatever Happened to Baby Jane?

With downtown becoming the latest hot neighborhood, the quasi-public group that oversees Downtown Crossing has decided that the pushcarts that have long lined Washington and Summer streets are declasse and need to be removed immediately, the Globe reports.

The Downtown Boston Business Improvement District, which levies fees on Downtown Crossing merchants for promotional efforts and WalMart-style greeters, has told pushcart operators they have to vacate the area by the end of the month, the Globe says.

Petition to save the pushcarts.