Sunday, 3 January 2016

Poupées Russes
(2005)


[Russian Dolls]

Bravura piece of entertainment that’s well plotted, well acted and carefully and cleverly directed.

Romain Duris is the hero guiding us through what is basically a portmanteau piece based on his character’s sexual adventures. This movie reflects well the ennui and anomie of contemporary Western culture in being both a witty and a perceptive look at modern sexual relationships.

Where it fails lies in it having no insight into love. This matches the characters’ essential anhedonia; manifesting itself in serial romances that are little better than promiscuity or unpaid prostitution. To claim that love is a mystery - as the film finally does - is a cop out made by those who fear to admit they don’t know what love is because they’ve not only never experienced it, but never will.

Clever, but just not quite clever enough to be great.

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Science:



No science is immune to the infection of politics and the corruption of power.



Jacob Bronowski… (1908 - 74), British scientist, author. Encounter (London, July 1971).


Sleep of Reason:



The dream of reason produces monsters. Imagination deserted by reason creates impossible, useless thoughts. United with reason, imagination is the mother of all art and the source of all its beauty.



Francisco José de Goya y Lucientes… (1746-1828), Spanish painter. Caption to Caprichos, number 43, a series of eighty etchings completed in 1798, satirical and grotesque in form.


Humans & Aliens:



I am human and let nothing human be alien to me.



Terence… (circa 190-159 BC), Roman dramatist. Chremes, in The Self-Tormentor [Heauton Timorumenos], act 1, scene 1.


Führerprinzip:



One leader, one people, signifies one master and millions of slaves… There is no organ of conciliation or mediation interposed between the leader and the people, nothing in fact but the apparatus - in other words, the party - which is the emanation of the leader and the tool of his will to oppress. In this way the first and sole principle of this degraded form of mysticism is born, the Führerprinzip, which restores idolatry and a debased deity to the world of nihilism.