Notebook of November 5th, 2008
Farewell to the worst President of the history of the United States.
Notebook of September 16th, 2006
My favourite movies in the 2005/2006 cinematographic season:
L’enfant by J.P. e L. Dardenne
Match Point by W. Allen
A Prairie Home Companion by R. Altman
Where the truth lies by A. Egoyan
Don’t come knockin’ by W. Wenders
Oliver Twist by R. Polanski
Viva Zapatero! by S. Guzzanti
Notebook of October 20th, 2005
The Spanish Bench has issued an international warrant of arrest, charging three U.S. soldiers for the killing of the journalist José Couso, occurred in Baghdad on april 2003, when an U.S. tank stroke Hotel Palestine.
Now, is there anyone who still remembers Nicola Calipari? Hadn’t there been an italian expertise of Calipari’s car, which contradicted the description of events provided by the U.S. Army?
In his recent intervention at the FAO convention, Carlo Azeglio Ciampi said that only a sick society can spend hundreds of milliards on armaments, while millions of children are starving to death.
Someone, at last, had the courage to say such an evident truth so plainly and so clearly.
But wars and armaments aren’t the real problem. Our society’s disease is called capitalism. Who takes advantage of conflicts – and not only those concerning war? Actually they are of profit to an economic system that must be eternally in motion to produce plus-value. An ideal peace throughout the world could easily make market economy collapse, as this one must avail itself of any possible (also illicit) way to support capitals’ exchanges.
When capitalism is recognized as the economic system which demonstrated to be the best welfare producer throughout the history, two main things are forgot:
a) “welfare” is taken in a strictly material meaning
and
b) this welfare isn’t shared but from a little percentage of world’s population.
When Western Powers go and carry “liberty”, “welfare” and “market economy” to some Third World nation, as a matter of fact they take possession and exploit the nation’s resources, leaving to the indigenous a lack of social organisation near to chaos, and destroying in few days an age-old order, however backward it could seem to our eyes.
All that is obvious: to play capitalism you have to know the rules since long time, and you need great capitals to move. That’s what Western Powers do, when they go and carry “liberty” to the unlucky Third World country (to which they maybe sold armaments until the day before); and that’s exactly what the Third World country cannot absolutely do after its “liberation”.
And so, we still have Kipling’s “white men’s burden”.
Notebook of September 12th, 2005
My favourite movies in the 2004/2005 cinematographic season
(a very bad season, anyway):
Saraband by I. Bergman
The Aviator by M. Scorsese
Land of plenty by W. Wenders
Le chiavi di casa by G. Amelio
The incredibles by B. Bird
Notebook of June 10th 2005
“I know what’s going on in the world
I know that everything is falling
but in the morning
when people sleep
with their usual discontent
it takes me anything,
also a small gleam
a well known feeling
a landscape, I don’t know
And I feel good, I feel good
as a dreamer
I don’t know if it’s right
but I feel good, what a shame.
I feel good, right now right here
it’s not my fault if it happens.
It’s like an illogical mirth
I don’t know why
I don’t know what it is.
As if I suddenly
took the right
to live the present.
I feel good...”
(Giorgio Gaber)
Compare this thought by Spinoza (“Ethica”):
“Duration is the indefinite elapse of being”
to this line by Peter Handke (“Song to duration”):
“duration is the sensation of living”
The importance of memory. The mad rhythm of today’s life, mass-media and the triumph of ephemeral are
trying to delete this formidable ethical weapon - at least in Western society. It’s not simply a matter of
remembering, as a purpose not to reiterate old mistakes: memory helps to find a way and therefore to make new choices.
That’s why tradition is important (from latin “tradere”: “to hand down”); that’s
why Classics are important: because they mean memory.
Notebook of July 26th, 2004
“I complained I had no shoes, and I met a man without feet” (Chinese proverb)
My favourite movies in the 2003/2004 cinematographic season:
Buongiorno, notte by M. Bellocchio
Dogville by L. von Trier
Vozvraschenie by A. Zvyagintsev
La meglio gioventù by M. T. Giordana
Zatoichi by T. Kitano
The five obstructions by J. Leth and L. von Trier
Les invasions barbares by D. Arcand
Master and Commander by P. Weir
“Many masters of mine have never known me, they didn’t choose me as a disciple,
they were already dead when I started, all they had done and written was not addressed to me.
This is objectively verifiable, nevertheless it isn’t true. All their life and their acting
were the formulation of a mysterious message exclusively addressed to me.
I spend my life trying to decode this message which made its home in my body and my soul,
keeping them alive.” (Eugenio Barba)
Notebook of May 20th, 2004
Invoking O.N.U. after having denied its authority one year ago, the anglo-american coalition begins
its shipping off from Iraq, with diplomatic solutions very similar to those used in Vietnam thirty
years ago.
No traces of mass destruction weapons (do you remember? That was war’s official justification);
instead: much destruction, thousands of deaths, Iraq left to total chaos.
U.S. economy remained still. Mr. Bush is the only President of the U.S.A. I can remember, who was
unable to raise economy again even with a war. Instead: scandals about torture on prisoners, and
shadows about the development of September 11th’ tragedy. Osama bin Laden still alive and
kicking.
One good news in this long dark period: Aznar’s defeat. It’s cheering up that bad faith, beyond
every limit, become a boomerang.
What about Iraq now? A solution could be to restore Saddam Hussein’s tyranny. The ones who
applauded him, and afterwards applauded his statue’s fall, are now challenging Americans. Perhaps
they would be ready to welcome him again.
Notebook of August 12th, 2003
My favourite movies in the 2002/2003 cinematographic season:
The pianist by R. Polanski
L’homme du train by P. Leconte
Gangs of New York by M. Scorsese
Minority Report by S. Spielberg
About Schmidt by A. Payne
Ma femme est une actrice by Y. Attal.
If you are interested in my personal list of the 94 greatest Masters in the history of Cinema, please click here.
The number 94 is not casual: considering that there are almost 80 directors worldwide recognized as absolute Masters,
I tried to add about twenty names, balancing my personal taste with the objective historical importance of the considered directors.
I tried to represent all the most important schools and currents in the list, as well as the different genres and geographic areas of
production. I was not able, in all conscience, to achieve the number 100. Maybe it’s better: the list remains open to further elaborations...
Notebook of May 1st, 2003
And so: where are all these mass destruction weapons? (They need to be imported from
America...)
Notebook of March 18th, 2003
“The man who is able to kill makes every comedy become serious” (Paul
Valéry)
Five good reasons to make war against Iraq:
1) The war in Afghanistan was not enough to raise the U.S. economy again;
2) Going on obstructing the political and economical development of the European Union
(before the war in Afghanistan, the Euro was dangerously increasing its value compared to
the U.S. Dollar);
3) During the war, petroleum price could rise considerably. The U.S.A. are among the
greatest petroleum producing countries in the world. President Bush is supported by the
major texan petroleum trusts;
4) After Afghanistan, having power over another strategic area in the heart of Islam, that
is going on resisting the U.S. homologation of the world;
5) Impressing that only the U.S.A. reached maturity to hold mass destruction weapons.
Quiz:
a) Iraq goes on denying holding mass destruction weapons; the U.S.A., in spite of want of
evidence, are sure that those weapons exist: on this ground they are ready to make war
against Iraq;
b) North Korea declares to resume its atomic program and expels the A.I.E.A. inspectors; it
declares to be ready to use the atomic bomb and carries missile tests out. The U.S.A.
reply: “Let’s talk about it for a diplomatic solution”.
Question: what is uncorrect in this account?
It would be enough to invest big amounts in alternative energy research to defeat Arab
countries; moreover it would be a wise policy also from the ecological point of view. On the
other hand, this would create some troubles to the industrial and capitalistic systems of today
(please see above point 3 of “Five good reasons...”).
And finally: let’s make poor Oriana Fallaci happy, at last!
Notebook of May 11th, 2002
“...BROTHERHOOD - GOVERNMENT - SOLIDARITY - TOLERANCE - PACIFISM - etc.!
No age ever was so PARODICALLY ETHIC, like this one! and therefore so ridiculously
AMORAL!” (Carmelo Bene)
If Mr. Le Pen had been out of the law, he would have been recognized as an outlaw a long
time ago. If what he says and does is legal, then it is useless outcrying and calling to arms
in defence of democracy, when 20% of French people vote for him. The problem is not Mr.
Le Pen: it is those people who vote for him. Now that Mr. Chirac has won and tranquillity
returned in Europe, everything is getting “normal” again, and the problem is
going to be removed or, in any case, not deeply examined, until it will come up once again.
False democracy: everybody can tell their opinion, but when something goes wrong
it’s “us” who will decide what’s democracy.
Fortuyn’s murder. The one who instigates to hatred possibly becomes a victim of
hatred. Real democracy: democracy of responsibility - if I say mad things, I can’t
complain about a madman’s action.
“Cultural industry offers products which are fit to everybody’s taste, on
condition that one gives up with taste; it bestows all forms of vitality, on condition that
one renounces to life, it bestows all forms of activism, on condition that one forgoes
every activity (...). People enter the cultural industry to achieve every possible
appearance: it is sufficient to give up with substance and with the idea of true and false
(an idea which is more and more difficult to maintain because of the techniques of exact
reproduction)”.
(E. Zolla, 1966)
Notebook of November 15th, 2001
“When superior people hear about the rule,
they carefully and skilfully put it into practice.
When ordinary people hear about the rule,
it sounds vague and indefinite.
When inferior people hear about the rule,
they laugh.
If they didn’t laugh at it,
it wouldn’t be worth taking it as a rule.”
(De Dao Jing)
Twelve books I would carry with me on a space-ship flying towards infinite:
I Ching
Odyssey by Homer.
The Song of Songs
The Divine Comedy by Dante.
Hamlet by William Shakespeare.
Tonio Kroeger by Thomas Mann.
Ulysses by James Joyce.
O livro do Desassossego por Bernardo Soares by Fernando Pessoa.
Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus and Philosophische Untersuchungen
by Ludwig Wittgenstein.
Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov.
La pute de la côte normande by Marguerite Duras.
“I don’t evolve, I travel” (Fernando Pessoa)
When I read or hear phrases about an artist like:
“...more and more alienated from his public”,
I can’t feel but interest and curiosity towards someone
who follows (and pursues) his creative path,
rightly taking no notice about clichÈs and repetitions
which “his public” would expect from him.
“Let everybody go where he wants to go
Let everybody grow old as he likes
But please don’t teach me
What freedom is”
(Francesco Guccini)
Notebook of April 22d, 2001
“When life gets difficult to stand, we think about a change of
situation. But the most important and effective change, which concerns
our behaviour, never crosses our mind, and it’s very difficult
for us deciding to put it into practice.”
(Ludwig Wittgenstein)
My ideal film library:
The cameraman, E. Sedgwick (1928).
Un chien andalou, L. Buñuel (1929).
City lights, C. Chaplin (1931).
Les enfants du paradis, M. Carné (1943/5).
The big sleep, H. Hawks (1946).
Smultronstället, I. Bergman (1957).
L’année dernière à Marienbad, A. Resnais
(1961).
2001: a space Odissey, S. Kubrick (1968).
Morte a Venezia, L. Visconti (1971).
Ultimo tango a Parigi, B. Bertolucci (1972).
Pat Garrett & Billy the Kid, S. Peckinpah (1973).
Barry Lyndon, S. Kubrick (1975).
The Rocky Horror Picture show, J. Sharman (1975).
Annie Hall, W. Allen (1977).
Apocalypse now, F. F. Coppola (1979).
Love streams, J. Cassavetes (1984).
Der Himmel über Berlin, W. Wenders (1987).
Une historie de vent, J. Ivens (1988).
Morte di un matematico napoletano, M. Martone (1992).
The Truman show, P. Weir (1998).
In ancient chinese writing, “happiness” is represented by two ideograms symbolizing an altar and two hands raising a cup. This is to mean that happiness is in itself a manifestation of gratitude for all that is given to us.