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selenakWe have two book fairs in Germany, one in autumn in Frankfurt and one in spring in Leipzig; I'm currently at the second one, which is why it'll take me a while to catch up with fannish tv etc. However, I spotted the TARDIS herself as well as Kili and Fili at the book fair, not to mention I heard world famous cinematographer Michael Ballhaus dish about Scorsese, Fassbinder, Jack Nicholson and Joe Pesci. More, with pictorial proof and illustration, under the cut to protect your innocent eyes.
Before reunification and for a while after, the Leipzig Book Fair used to take place in the Gewandhaus, which is lovely and old and quaint but also small in terms of the exploding publishing world. So the newly reunified Germany sprung the money for new buildings. To wit, these:
Inside, the central hall looks like this when there's a speech to be held:
The back entrance, where you can also catch some hair in between strolling up and down the aisles and browsing through books and chatting with book trade folk, looks like this and always makes me feel like I'm already living in the future:
Now, the Leipzig Book Fair is also the meeting point for a lot of Manga and comic book fans, which is why you meet the occasional cosplayer while hastening from hall to hall.
More about them - lots more - in a moment. The main point of the fair is of course to present new books. Which occasionally happens in grand style, as when Denis Scheck does it.
In the same forum, Michael Ballhaus presented his memoirs. A word about Michael Ballhaus. Germany produced some world famous directors in its time (more pre WWII than post WWII), but he's undeniable the most famous German cinematographer ever. He first became famous on a national level through his work with the enfant terrible of the German cinema in the 1970s, Rainer Maria Fassbinder, and did nine movies with him, then went to Hollywood and struck up a decades long partnership with Martin Scorsese. Even if you haven't seen any Scorsese movies, you've probably familiar with a signature Ballhaus camera move, the 360° camera sweep (a non Scorsese film he used this in was "The Fabulous Baker Boys" for the key scene with Michelle Pfeiffer). He also worked with Ang Lee on Sense and Sensibility. In short, he's The Guy.
The interviewer asked him about Fassbinder first. 'Twas dislike on sight - Fassbinder, who called everyone "du" said "Sie" and "Herr Ballhaus" - but workwise, they clicked and sparked, and hence nine movies ensued until Fassbinder's drug habits - which furthered his worst character traits - had gotten so much out of control that Ballhaus had had enough. Also, Hollywood.
Where he met Marty. Now, as with many creative people, the creations that were their most successfull aren't necessarily the ones they love best. Michael Ballhaus said the one film he in retrospect regards as their best was Goodfellas, the fact that Joe Pesci is real life crazy and threatened to kill Scorsese if he didn't get the part (for which he originally was deemed too old by Marty), which with Joe Pesci you had to take as more than rethorical notwithstanding. Partly because Scorsese as a child was friends with the son of a local Mafia boss and knew the milieu but partly because it all came together. All this being said, Ballhaus loves Age of Innocence better, and the one which both he and Scorsese loved passionately but which was a total flop which doesn't stop them from still loving it passionately was The Last Temptation of Christ. That, he said, was the one which meant the most to Martin Scorsese, it was so deeply, deeply personal.
The one Ballhaus was most unhappy with? The last one they did together, The Departed. Partly because of Jack Nicholson and the shooting conditions, for which, he said, Nicholson wasn't really to blame because Scorsese literally didn't dare to direct him in any of his scenes. He said "Jack, what do you want to do?" and did no more in any scenes featuring him. And if you do that with Jack Nicholson, you get Jack Nicholson taking over, which Ballhaus hated. Scorsese himself, M.B. said, was deeply depressed about the film entire (not just the Nicholson stuff) and said to the cutter they'd have to cut it as fast paced as possible so no one would notice how bad it is. Which was the other thing Ballhaus hates about the picture - for him, it was his work cut into fragments - but then, he added, this is how "young people today watch movies, so it worked, and Marty finally got the Oscar, for this film."
Favourite actress to work with: Emma Thompson, hands down. He also relished giving a new look to Michelle Pfeiffer - he says he wanted to photograph her differently in Baker Boys than she had been until that point, she needed to look harder, like she'd lived the life her character did, and she went with it instead of being star image cautious, and it paid off - but Emma Thompson charmed him completely and they had tea and chatted a lot during shooting.
Most amazing in a good way actor: Daniel Day-Lewis. Who remained, as is his want, in character as Bill the Butcher, for the entire shoot of Gangs of New York, down to using Bill's voice and accent when during meals, and the crew on set joked that surely even his wife was now addressing him as "Bill" - and then, the moment the last scene he had was a wrap, you could see the character sliding off him, body language at all, and you suddenly heard a different voice and met a new person. "He was Danny then. I've never seen anything like it before or after, not in all the decades in the industry."
As I mentioned before, Leipzig is a meeting point for comics and manga fans. So much so that this year, they got their very own hall. Which made all the publishers of fantasy and sci fi novels deeply unhappy, because in previous years, when the comics publishers were in the same hall as the fantasy book publishers, they thus automatically also were visited by the Manga kids (the basic idea, as far as the book publishers were concerned, was, "Come for the Manga, leave having found out books without pictures can also be cool"), but not this year. The ones I talked to signalled they would protest with the book fair organizers to change this back again. The hall of their own the Manga and comics fans got was this one:
Now, I'm not into Manga. So the majority of the costumes had no meaning for me, beyond being impressed by the dedication and level of detail. However, occasionally you come across a non Manga costume, such as these guests from (cinematic) Middle Earth:
Or Captain Jack Sparrow, mysteriously drinking green tea at the Japanese tea house instead of rum:
And as a particular highlight, there was a TARDIS!
Well, nothing can top a TARDIS, obviously, so I shan't try. Basically, the Leipzig Book Fair rocks. And thus I leave you with one of the posters:
Before reunification and for a while after, the Leipzig Book Fair used to take place in the Gewandhaus, which is lovely and old and quaint but also small in terms of the exploding publishing world. So the newly reunified Germany sprung the money for new buildings. To wit, these:
Inside, the central hall looks like this when there's a speech to be held:
The back entrance, where you can also catch some hair in between strolling up and down the aisles and browsing through books and chatting with book trade folk, looks like this and always makes me feel like I'm already living in the future:
Now, the Leipzig Book Fair is also the meeting point for a lot of Manga and comic book fans, which is why you meet the occasional cosplayer while hastening from hall to hall.
More about them - lots more - in a moment. The main point of the fair is of course to present new books. Which occasionally happens in grand style, as when Denis Scheck does it.
In the same forum, Michael Ballhaus presented his memoirs. A word about Michael Ballhaus. Germany produced some world famous directors in its time (more pre WWII than post WWII), but he's undeniable the most famous German cinematographer ever. He first became famous on a national level through his work with the enfant terrible of the German cinema in the 1970s, Rainer Maria Fassbinder, and did nine movies with him, then went to Hollywood and struck up a decades long partnership with Martin Scorsese. Even if you haven't seen any Scorsese movies, you've probably familiar with a signature Ballhaus camera move, the 360° camera sweep (a non Scorsese film he used this in was "The Fabulous Baker Boys" for the key scene with Michelle Pfeiffer). He also worked with Ang Lee on Sense and Sensibility. In short, he's The Guy.
The interviewer asked him about Fassbinder first. 'Twas dislike on sight - Fassbinder, who called everyone "du" said "Sie" and "Herr Ballhaus" - but workwise, they clicked and sparked, and hence nine movies ensued until Fassbinder's drug habits - which furthered his worst character traits - had gotten so much out of control that Ballhaus had had enough. Also, Hollywood.
Where he met Marty. Now, as with many creative people, the creations that were their most successfull aren't necessarily the ones they love best. Michael Ballhaus said the one film he in retrospect regards as their best was Goodfellas, the fact that Joe Pesci is real life crazy and threatened to kill Scorsese if he didn't get the part (for which he originally was deemed too old by Marty), which with Joe Pesci you had to take as more than rethorical notwithstanding. Partly because Scorsese as a child was friends with the son of a local Mafia boss and knew the milieu but partly because it all came together. All this being said, Ballhaus loves Age of Innocence better, and the one which both he and Scorsese loved passionately but which was a total flop which doesn't stop them from still loving it passionately was The Last Temptation of Christ. That, he said, was the one which meant the most to Martin Scorsese, it was so deeply, deeply personal.
The one Ballhaus was most unhappy with? The last one they did together, The Departed. Partly because of Jack Nicholson and the shooting conditions, for which, he said, Nicholson wasn't really to blame because Scorsese literally didn't dare to direct him in any of his scenes. He said "Jack, what do you want to do?" and did no more in any scenes featuring him. And if you do that with Jack Nicholson, you get Jack Nicholson taking over, which Ballhaus hated. Scorsese himself, M.B. said, was deeply depressed about the film entire (not just the Nicholson stuff) and said to the cutter they'd have to cut it as fast paced as possible so no one would notice how bad it is. Which was the other thing Ballhaus hates about the picture - for him, it was his work cut into fragments - but then, he added, this is how "young people today watch movies, so it worked, and Marty finally got the Oscar, for this film."
Favourite actress to work with: Emma Thompson, hands down. He also relished giving a new look to Michelle Pfeiffer - he says he wanted to photograph her differently in Baker Boys than she had been until that point, she needed to look harder, like she'd lived the life her character did, and she went with it instead of being star image cautious, and it paid off - but Emma Thompson charmed him completely and they had tea and chatted a lot during shooting.
Most amazing in a good way actor: Daniel Day-Lewis. Who remained, as is his want, in character as Bill the Butcher, for the entire shoot of Gangs of New York, down to using Bill's voice and accent when during meals, and the crew on set joked that surely even his wife was now addressing him as "Bill" - and then, the moment the last scene he had was a wrap, you could see the character sliding off him, body language at all, and you suddenly heard a different voice and met a new person. "He was Danny then. I've never seen anything like it before or after, not in all the decades in the industry."
As I mentioned before, Leipzig is a meeting point for comics and manga fans. So much so that this year, they got their very own hall. Which made all the publishers of fantasy and sci fi novels deeply unhappy, because in previous years, when the comics publishers were in the same hall as the fantasy book publishers, they thus automatically also were visited by the Manga kids (the basic idea, as far as the book publishers were concerned, was, "Come for the Manga, leave having found out books without pictures can also be cool"), but not this year. The ones I talked to signalled they would protest with the book fair organizers to change this back again. The hall of their own the Manga and comics fans got was this one:
Now, I'm not into Manga. So the majority of the costumes had no meaning for me, beyond being impressed by the dedication and level of detail. However, occasionally you come across a non Manga costume, such as these guests from (cinematic) Middle Earth:
Or Captain Jack Sparrow, mysteriously drinking green tea at the Japanese tea house instead of rum:
And as a particular highlight, there was a TARDIS!
Well, nothing can top a TARDIS, obviously, so I shan't try. Basically, the Leipzig Book Fair rocks. And thus I leave you with one of the posters:
no subject
Date: 2014-03-15 07:39 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2014-03-15 03:50 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2014-03-15 12:31 pm (UTC)Displaying the TARDIS console on the underskirt is inspired, though I'm slightly alarmed by the positioning of the "Free for use of Public - Pull to Open" sign.
no subject
Date: 2014-03-15 03:52 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2014-03-16 06:49 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2014-03-16 01:22 pm (UTC)