CineFemme profile picture

CineFemme

..a cinemamuse requires 400 séances a week.

About Me

3108 visitors

Happy Chinese New Year February 7th! The Year of the Rat!

My real name Moira is derived from the Greek Fates- the Moirae : Clotho , or spinner of the thread of life, Lachesis , measurer, and Atropos cutter. I am an international cinéaste and love intelligent, artistic films made with creativity. I also am keenly interested in film theory and discussions about the operations within the language of film. Bring it on! Based in San Francisco, Stockholm and Paris. Am one of the world's leading experts on the work of filmmaker Maya Deren and have been invited to speak about her in Italy, France, Spain, Germany, and Sweden. I also make experimental films in the spirit of Deren's "personal film".

I agree with Deren that a filmmaker has to make use of "the art instrument", camera and editing in order to create "something new". Maya is known and still inspires filmmakers today. How is that someone who worked in the non commercial short film genre continues to influence young filmmakers nearly 45 years after her death? The answer can be found by closely observing her innovating editing techniques and cinematography: jump cuts, double exposure, and creative uses of temporality through duration.
My website [mayaderen.org] is dedicated to this excellent filmmaker that has left a wonderful legacy to us.

Music is closely related to cinema because it moves and influences the mind, soul and emotions, as do dance and martial arts, my other passions. Art is the creative healing force of the universe and the most precious thing we have. During difficult times in the world the artist is hounded, no wonder that the arts are cut when the economy is down. It is not something we can do without, nor is it an expendable luxury. Its our life force and can not be blocked or we lose our soul.

Maya Deren was an artistic filmmaker that not only made ethnographic films such as shooting 18 000 ft of Haitian rituals and secular dances in the 1940's and 1950's but a film called "Meditation on Violence" (1947), a film on Shao-lin and Wu Tang martial arts.
She was married to Teiji Ito who played over a dozen musical instruments. Beset by financial difficulties through most of her career, she produced and distributed all her own movies, and never gave up her art. Her ashes were scattered at Mt Fuji by Teiji Ito after her death in 1961. See my reviews of her films on Maya Deren 2x, in Film International, promoting intellectual film culture since 1973.
Cinema, music, dance. That's my world and welcome to it!
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If You're Going to San Francisco, Scott McKenzie
HOMAGE TO INGMAR BERGMAN
Ingmar Bergman, Liv Ullman and Bibi Andersson, interview in 1965 by Nils Petter Sundgren for Swedish Television about "Persona" - a film he wanted to call "Cinematography". Other interviews on his plays such as Kung Lear , after he received the Oscar for Fanny and ALexander and the tax scandal of 1976. Mostly in Swedish..... Ingmar never told us what his films were about--he left that up to us....
The talented Gong Lì.
++
*TIX*
Sotirio Bellou, the great Rembetika singer from Greece Anna Karina et Jean Paul Belmondo, 1965 Jodie Foster: "Je t'attends depuis la nuit des temps"

Jodie Foster: Thanks her partner Cydney Bernard

My Interests

Queer culture, cinema, music, dance and martial arts. Making experimental films. Creative gatherings with artistic souls. Alchemy, rituals and magic.
Travel: Paris, Stockholm, San Francisco, Venice, the Greek islands. Soon to be: Hawaii, Japan and China. Experiencing some of the 400 cine screenings a week in Paris. Climbing up the "Tower Tour" of Notre Dame de Paris.
Cities surrounded by water. Walking along the Seine next to Notre Dame de Paris. Taking the Waxholm ferries in the Stockholm archipelago and the Djurgårds ferry to Gamla Stan where I used to have my atelj&eacute, riding the vaporetto to the Peggy Guggenheim and to The Lido for the Venice Film Festival. Swimming in the Aegean in Lesbos Greece, birthplace of Sappho (no shark,no undertow). Overlooking the San Francisco Bay and Golden Gate from Pacific Heights; riding the cable car up California Ave and walking through the Palace of Fine Arts and the lagoon around it.
Covering film festivals such as Venice, Cannes, Berlin, Stockholm Göteborg, San Francisco (Frameline, SF Intl Film Fest, Asian-American Film Fest) Créteil & Cineffable, Paris, Udine Far East Film Festival, Italy. My number one film criticism venue is Movie Magazine International, San Francisco. I also write for Filmfestivals.com, Paris, Greencine, The Swedish Bulletin and Film International, Sweden.

    Filmfestivals.com-Cannes Film Festival Videoblog
    Créteil Films de Femmes
    Cineffable Festival International du Film Lesbien & Feministe de Paris
    Far East Film Festival, Udine Italy
    La Mostra di Venezia Int.le d'Arte Cinematografica

I'd like to meet:

1)"The Real Moira Sullivan" meets the Mayor of San Francisco, Gavin Newsom, Pride Parade, 2007. Newsom signed hundreds of same sex marriage certificates at City Hall before Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger said "Terminate"! 2)"The Real Moira Sullivan" Meets International Queer Filmfestival Programmers from Paris (Cineffable) and Brasil(Mix Brasil) at Pride 2007, San Francisco. 3)"The Real Moira Sullivan" meets filmmaker Tina Mabry, co/screenwriter of "Itty Bitty Titty Committee " at Queer Women of Color Film Festival, June 2007. The Real Moira Sullivan is an Internationally accredited film journalist and member of the International Federation of Film Critics (FIPRESCI) the Swedish Film Critics Association , and the international correspondent for Movie Magazine International broadcast on KUSF San Francisco around the world every week. I also write for Film Festivals.com and Film International as well as Greencine when in Venice, Paris or Udine.
I've met quite a few inspirational artists in my work: Ingmar Bergman, Nausika, Jamie Babbit, Ulrike Ottinger, Takeshi Kitano, Robert De Niro, Irene Pappas, Charlotte Rampling, Jeanne Moreau, David Lynch, Gena Rowlands, Lauren Bacall, Roman Polanski, John Carpenter, Kim Ki Duk, Meryl Streep, Al Pacino, Jacqueline Bissett, Matthew Barney, Björk, Ellen Barkin, John Carpenter, Hayao Miyasaki, Mira Nair, Lena Endre, Harriet Andersson, Anita Ekberg.
I enjoy meeting artists and always feel at home with creative people. I am interested in meeting new artistic souls with vision and courage - not least the Mayor San Francisco Gavin Newsom who is the first mayor in the USA to create a plan for city wide health care for all and a strong advocate of LGBT rights and champion of lesbian and gay marriage.
Marilyn Monroe's Production Company

Music:

Eclectic. All music that has a good sound regardless of genre. Good vocalists supported by and /or good musicians and lyricists. Be that it may, Amy Hanaiali’i Gilliom, Um Kalthoum,Yoshida Brothers, Haris Alexiou, Vicki Randall, Metalchicks, Buffalo Daughter, Sotiria Bellou, Rembetika music, Edith Piaf, Dalida, Georges Brassens, The Staple Singers, Jefferson Airplane, Moby, Jacques Brel, LCD Soundsystem, Nirvana (Kurt Cobain), Anatomie Bousculaire, Bei-Bei, David Bowie, Barbra Streisand, Marie Callas, Jim Morrison, The Dixie Chicks, and for a good sample of eclectic greatness live on radio 24:7: the best playlist artists from [Novaplanet.com] in Paris.

Movies:

World cinema, particularly European and Asian cinema. Favorites: The White Mane (Albert Lamorisse), Jeanne Dielman (Chantelle Akerman) Bound (Wachowski Bros), Orlando (Sally Potter), Blood of a Poet (Cocteau) Meshes of the Afternoon (Deren), In the Mood for Love (Wong Kar Wai), Freak Orlando (Ulrike Ottinger) Les Enfants Terribles (Jean Pierre Melville) , Spirited Away - Princess Mononoke (Hiyao Miyasaki), Ki-duk Kim (3-Iron), Phaedra and Never on a Sunday (Jules Dassin) , Caro Diario (Nanni Morretti), Fellini Roma, Mama Roma (Pier Paulo Pasolini), Année dernière à Marienbad, (Alain Resnais), A Bout de Souffle (Godard), Kamikaze Girls (Tetsuya Nakashima), Songs from the Second Floor (Roy Andersson) Suffocation (Bingjian Zhang),Hairspray (John Waters) & Brokeback Mountain, Ang Lee.
During this past year, I recommend: Sweeney Todd (Tim Burton), Curse of the Golden Flower (Zhang Yimou). All this Our Exile (Patrick Tam),Road to San Diego (Carlos Sorin), Dans Paris (Christophe Honoré), The Ghosts of Cité de Soleil (Asgar Leth), The Host (Bomg Joon-ho), Forever (Heddy Honigman), Opera Jawa (Garin Nugroho), Lust, Caution (Ang Lee) & Adam Shankman), The Brave One (Neil Jordan). More to come!

Television:

The Avengers, Kung Fu, Hawaii Five O, Charlie's Angels. Any recommendation by Monica Sullivan, coproducer of Movie Magazine International. I am totally retro. Don't really like new TV shows, well, maybe The L-Word, X-Files, Sopranos, Alias. The kind of TV that becomes retro...Don't really like TV, gives me angst.

Books:

Northern Lights: Bill Pullman, Herge: The Adventures of Tintin, Fulcanelli: Le Mystere des Cathedrales, Xialou Guo:The Concise Chinese English Dictionary for Lovers, Hayao Miyasaki (manga), Maya Deren: Divine Horsemen, The 42nd Parallel: John Dos Passos, Cannery Row: John Steinbeck, Jane Fonda: My Life So Far.

Heroes:

The Goddess in Paris and San Francisco, Sappho, Dana Johnson, Millan Jönsson, Jeanne d'Arc, Frida Kahlo, Jane Fonda, Xiaolu Guo, Beijng, a great young filmmaker and writer! Jean Cocteau for fantastic creativity, Maya Deren for the best role model a filmmaker and cineaste could ever hope to have. PS I'm trying to warm up to Andy Warhol, excellent exhibition in Stockholm now through May 4th! And--Toulouse-Lautrec at the National Museum, through February 25th--May 25th.

My Blog

Jag Gifter Mig!

Sort of kind of , maybe, maybe not. Ellen is taking up too much space! "I finally got what I dreamed of: money and a gorgeous girlfriend". Really? Or was she joking, you know Ellen. Marriage is such a...
Posted by CineFemme on Sun, 18 May 2008 08:04:00 PST

We Won: California Legalizes Marriage for Lesbians and Gay Men

California is not only a state, its a state of mind. This is a victory that is so right on. California dares to call it MARRIAGE, not registered partnership as in the hygienical courts of Sweden. But ...
Posted by CineFemme on Fri, 16 May 2008 02:15:00 PST

Et in Arcadia Ego (Greek version)

"Even in Arcadia, I exist" is the voice of Death: Thanatos. This statement is a "memento mori".In Poussin's painting "Les bergers d'Arcadie" ("The Arcadian Shepherds") a shepherd points to someone wit...
Posted by CineFemme on Wed, 21 May 2008 05:27:00 PST

Oscar-itis Numero 80

The annual twists and turns of the Hollywood collision course, number 80, brought to you from a Swedish perspective by yours truly!CinéFemme at the Oscars...
Posted by CineFemme on Wed, 27 Feb 2008 08:02:00 PST

Farewell Rita (Rainy) Creighton

Farewell Rita "Rainy" Creighton
Posted by CineFemme on Sun, 05 Aug 2007 10:37:00 PST

Avec Le Temps

Avec Le Temps , interpreté Dalida(Léo Férré) Avec le temps,avec le temps, va, tout s'en va,on oublie le visageet l'on oublie la voix,le cSur quand ça bat plus,c'est pas la peine d'aller chercher plus ...
Posted by CineFemme on Wed, 20 Jun 2007 10:29:00 PST

Lesbian Film Pulled from Lineup at Frameline31, San Francisco

Frameline Pulls Lesbian Film at LGBT Festival
Posted by CineFemme on Tue, 19 Jun 2007 09:17:00 PST

Queer Women of Color Film Festival, San Francisco

Queer Women of Color Film Festival Report from San Francisco.
Posted by CineFemme on Tue, 12 Jun 2007 09:54:00 PST

Sotiria Bellou: Rebetissis, the Greek Blues

"Sotiria Bellou was the most significant Rebetissis of the "Classical" generation of Rebetiko artists . In fact she is the best known female vocalist from that entire period . With her characterist...
Posted by CineFemme on Tue, 29 May 2007 10:25:00 PST

80 years of Female Portraits in Cinema

Women in Film
Posted by CineFemme on Thu, 10 May 2007 03:20:00 PST