“To the question ‘Is cinema an art?’ my answer is, ‘What does it matter?’ You can make films or you can cultivate a garden. Both have as much claim to be called art as a poem by Verlaine or a painting by Delacroix. If your film or your garden is a good one it means that as a practitioner of cinema or gardening you are entitled to consider yourself an artist. The pastry-cook who makes a good cake is an artist. The ploughman with an old-fashioned plough creates a work of art when he ploughs a furrow. Art is not a calling in itself but the way in which one exercises a calling, and also the way in which one performs any human activity. I will give you my definition of art: art is ‘making’. The art of poetry is the art of making poetry. The art of love is the art of making love.

Here’s a new trailer for my good friend Nathan Christ’s fantastic, beautiful documentary ECHOTONE about Austin’s music scene. Check it out!

]]> http://earlierwork.net/2010/08/01/christopher-walken-in-the-anderson-tapes/feed/ 0 Jesse Trussell http://earlierwork.net/2010/07/19/my-i-write-like-results/ http://earlierwork.net/2010/07/19/my-i-write-like-results/#comments Mon, 19 Jul 2010 19:32:08 +0000 Jesse Trussell http://earlierwork.net/?p=2021 ]]>

14- Arrested for vagrancy, put on a chain gang from which he ESCAPED!

19- Worked as a ghostwriter for an astrologer in Los Angeles

23- Works as a machine operator at Lockheed

24- Nervous breakdown, temporarily goes blind

25- Starts acting

28- Serves in WW2

29- Nominated for an Oscar

31- Busted for possession of marijuana. Serves a week in jail, which he described to a reporter as like “Palm Springs, but without the riffraff”

38- Fired after pulling a prank on set where he threw someone into the San Francisco Bay

38- Stars in Night of the Hunter. NIGHT OF THE HUNTER

40- Releases a calypso album!

45- Stars in Cape Fear

50- Releases a country album called That Man, Robert Mitchum, Sings

60- Hosts SNL

63- Voice of the “Beef- It’s What’s For Dinner” ad campiagn

75- Wins lifetime achievement Oscar

78- Final film role in a Norwegian film called Pakten

Apparently the brilliant Mitchell and Webb are the faces of Apple’s Mac v. PC ads in the UK. I’m not a huge Peep Show fan, but That Mitchell and Webb Look is one of the best sketch comedy series I’ve seen lately. They’re all on Netflix Watch Instantly.

Video unrelated and slightly obnoxious.

From Lumiere and Company, wherein 41 international directors made 1 minute shorts using one of the original Lumiere cinematographe cameras.