DESERT MEN IN MACHINE-MADE ROBES

watching BBC News, this morning, a segment about 21st C. Afghanistan religious Shara Law was so off-putting, as bearded men, 'wearing' semi-automatic assault rifles, and carrying 'big sticks', beat 'others' for not observing some trivial gesture, required of their dogmatics... and women, for daring to show an ankle or their cheeks, or learning to read and write.....where MEN run the 'Show', perpetuating the ancient 'traditions' of this repressive, guilt-ridden religious Insanity........Annoyed, I turned to some 'Movie' channel, where yet another egregiously annoying 'religious' film was being broadcast {ironically, starring atheist, Max Von Sydow, one of my favorite actors since his 'Ingmar Bergman Days'}.....This Junk just doesn't fill me with awe and devotional, self-righteous reverential holiness....but. just reminds me of how long it will 'take' before all this piousness and devotion to the Imaginary Gods and their formulas for Everlasting Life will be dispersed by the Conscious interception of frontal lobe development...

EASTER FILM RETROSPECTIVE

 

Lounging abed this morning, writing and drawing.......the 1950's take on "BEN-HUR" was being 'presented' for TCM's Easter Morning viewers......I would look up at the screen when many of the widescreen, cinematic moments caught my attention.......The Film is great for film students to study and analyze, as it presents literally hundreds, if not thousands, of examples of botched 'dubs', peculiar edits, impossible visual scenarios, costumes and jewels of velvet, rayon moire and mid-century plastics, chariot wheels with torch-soldered stainless steel parts, 1950's takes on makeup and hair styles.....the list goes on...and on....modern tire marks in sand, cameras and lights in scenes....even reverse-printed frames......Yet, many of the scenes are spectacular.....even with the relentless and never-endingly annoying "music" soundtrack by Miklos Rozsa..... presented in super wide screen and vivid colors.....I lost interest, of course, near the film's ending....when Ben-Hur's leprosy-diseased mother and sister were miraculously "healed" as they watch Jesus' trip to the 'mount' and his death in the dismal rain......