#Nitrate Diva

[originalharmonysalad]

Trailer: The Return Of Doctor X (1939)

"I do enjoy THE RETURN OF DOCTOR X, for what it's worth, but I wish it were as good as its absolutely ripping trailer, which includes bits that aren't in the film."

The Nitrate Diva (@NitrateDiva) / Twitter

[kirnet]

After DAYSS I finally got gumball to eat god bless

[titleleaf]

Old-Time Radio/streaming radio drama recslist, with especial reference to horror

Somebody asked for recs for places to stream radio shows and otherwise listen to radio drama, but I can't find where they replied to me, so I'm just gonna do this here. This is far from an exhaustive list of sources or even a recs guide for specific episodes. but I find OTR (and less-old-timey radio drama) a great accompaniment to crafty tasks like sewing or doing art.

I would also be remiss not to mention Nitrate Diva, whose seasonal horror radio round-ups got me into that particular corner of the listening world. If you're looking for ideas of what to listen to, her guides are great -- not all mystery or thriller podcasts ran primarily-horror or supernatural content for most or even much of their programming time but she's cherry picked some amazing starting places.

Old Time Radio Downloads - does what it says on the tin, and should be streamable in your browser as well as downloadable. Hosts a wide spread of genres and some international programming, with episode information and more details than a lot of places. No search function that I can see, however, wtf.

Old Time Radio Researchers - volunteer org with an immense catalog of OTR programs available for free streaming, hosted by the Jim Beshires Memorial Episode Library,with 90,000+ episodes. Beyond their killer streaming archive they host OTTRPedia (with a great list of books their info is sourced from) and some episode scripts.

OTRCat - show catalogue and purchasing library for old-time radio shows on physical media like CD

Archive.org's Old Time Radio showcase

M.R. James On TV, Radio, and Film - not hosting but just a guide to various radio adaptations of M.R. James' stories between 1951 and 2010.

For specific program recs beyond NitrateDiva's above/"everything with Vincent Price in it, especially Fugue In C Minor",:

The Black Museum -- Orson Welles telling you weird stories about murder weapons from the Scotland Yard Black Museum. Sort of proto-true crime podcasting.

CBS Radio Mystery Theater - my parents, both big mystery and SF enjoyers, remember this from the 1970s and from later reruns! (And it tickled them both intensely that it appears in the Spielberg film Super 8.) Includes episode guide and ratings for all 1300+ episodes, and a great index of which programs are adaptations of other existing fiction, whether an ostensible adaptation of "Casting The Runes" as "These Will Kill You" or Plutarch's account of the murder of Julius Caesar.

CBC Radio Mystery Theater was apparently a thing out of Canada -- Leslie McMurtry has an amazing paper, "Sounds Like Murder: Early 1980s Gothic on North American Radio", about the history of gothic and/or horror programming in radio drama and the way CBC's program Nightfall reflected contemporary anxieties and committed to nihilistic uniquely-Canadian Gothic.

Many of these shows, including Nightfall and The Black Museum, are also streamable via Apple Podcasts. Not my preferred way to listen but also one of the ways I was introduced!

I enjoy modern narrative horror fiction podcasts and I'd love any resources anyone has about how to learn more about, or where to browse, other radio drama with horror themes. The BBC has done a number of great horror programs, as has Big Finish's kickass collection of shows, but I'm not sure the best way to go about digging into those.

[nitrateglow]

Halloween 2022 marathon:16-18

Deathtrap (dir. Sidney Lumet, 1982)

Depressed by the third theatrical flop in a row, thriller playwright Sidney Bruhl (Michael Caine) smells an opportunity when one of his students (Christopher Reeve) sends a cracking good draft to him for a second opinion. Aware this pay could be the hit he needs to revive his flagging career, Sidney’s mind turns to thoughts of theft and murder. And then the twistiest plot ever ensues.

If you’re unfamiliar with Ira Levin’s smash hit play Deathtrap, it is essentially a deconstruction of the style of stage thriller made popular by Agatha Christie and Frederick Knott. It’s extremely meta, and has an absolutely bonkers and unpredictable plot that is at turns hilarious and sinister. It was a massive success in the late 70s, running on Broadway for four years. When Warner Brothers purchased the movie rights, the studio spent over a million dollars for it, which at the time was the highest sum ever paid for the film rights of a non-musical play.

I don’t want to reveal too much about the plot in case anyone here has never read/seen the play or watched the movie before. I read the play years ago and remember reeling from all the turns the story took. It’s great fun and I would love to see this done on-stage someday.

I will say that the movie benefits from theatrically inspired direction and great performances. I was particularly blown away by Christopher Reeve. It saddens me that this man is only known as Superman, because he was immensely talented. I don’t want to say anymore because even praising his acting will spoil the movie-- just go get a copy!

Dracula (dir. Tod Browning, 1931)

Do I need to even share the plot? Count Dracula moves to England to snack on some fresh blood. Dr. Van Helsing says no. With a stake.

Tod Browning’s Dracula was a huge smash in 1931, but in the subsequent decades, historians and horror fans have feuded over whether it’s actually a “good film.” It is true that the screenplay has a lot of talky scenes-- a carryover from the movie’s stage source material. The middle act drags a bit too and some of the supporting actors are stiff and awkward. (Some might include the rubber bat as a flaw, but the sight of it bouncing giddily on a string fills me with glee, so I give it a pass.)

However, I still say the movie’s strengths outshine its weaknesses. Nitrate Diva made a great defense of the film years ago, which is much more eloquent than anything I could ever write about it, but I want to quote it in part:

Dracula may appear primitive, but therein lies its uncanny beauty. Sometimes sophistication isn’t half as convincing as simplicity. Eschewing ostentatious special effects and action sequences, the director chose to chill his audience with the silence and stillness of the grave.

As the documentary Universal Horror pointed out, audiences were accustomed to music during the silent era, so Browning wisely deployed the hissing nothingness of Dracula’s early talkie soundtrack to spook viewers. Similarly, the somnambulistic staging and acting reflect the emptiness of Dracula himself, a walking, talking corpse. Why do we wonder at film’s inertia? Its deadly title character freezes all that surrounds him, transforming every space into a tomb.

Basically, the film’s “creakiness” is part of what makes its atmosphere so compelling. (I find the same is true of Frankenstein.)

And then there’s the movie’s golden trio: Lugosi, Frye, and Van Sloan. Bela Lugosi is still absolutely uncanny and charismatic as Dracula, and Dwight Frye is both creepy and funny as Renfield. Edward Van Sloan makes for a great foil to Dracula, every bit as strong-willed and determined. I love the scene where he resists Dracula’s mind control in particular.

So yeah, the critics can try to stake this movie through the heart all they want. Flawed it may be, but it still endures as iconic horror cinema-- and a staple of my Halloween viewing.

Eyes Without a Face (dir. Georges Franju, 1960)

Master surgeon Dr. Genessier (Pierre Brasseur) desperately seeks to repair the face of his disfigured daughter Christianne (Edith Scob), so he starts kidnapping young women and removing theirs. However, his efforts prove futile and with each failure, Christiane only seems to fall deeper into despair and perhaps even madness...

I’ve known about Eyes Without a Face for years, but never got around to watching it until now. Holy crap-- it’s every bit as good as the hype: beautifully shot in black and white, and at points, genuinely uncomfortable (let’s just say they show one of the surgeries where the doctor removes the women’s faces-- and it’s genuinely disturbing and gross).

Lately, I’ve been thinking about how horror is best paired with two other moods: comedy or melancholy. Eyes Without a Face weds its horror to the latter and the result is a film that is lyrical and touching just as much as it is viscerally shocking. You feel bad for just about all the characters, even the villains.

What I find most fascinating about the movie is the dynamic between Christiane and Dr. Genessier. What a complicated duo-- Christiane longs for a normal face again, but she becomes horrified when she learns how her father has essentially kidnapped and maimed innocent women to pursue his goals. Christiane also harbors an amount of bitterness towards her father, who she sees as tyrannical in his desire to control everyone and everything. It is significant that the accident that disfigured her was his fault, the result of his dominating behavior manifesting itself behind the wheel.

As for Genessier, he’s more than just a tyrannical brute or your average mad scientist. His yearning to restore Christianne’s face is motivated by many factors: guilt, love, and yes, a desire to pursue his scientific interests (we see he also experiments on animals, suggesting that even though he loves his daughter, he does somewhat see her as a convenient human guinea pig). However, even he is disturbed by what he’s doing to his victims-- he’s reluctant to even kill them when he’s finished stealing their skin, though his empathy only goes so far.

The sad, sinister atmosphere reminded me a lot of another French horror classic, Les Diaboliques... and then I learned some of the writers behind the source material for that film actually did have a hand in the screenplay for Eyes Without a Face! So if you’re a fan of that film, you’ll probably enjoy this one too. I cannot recommend it enough!

[news24fr]

Afficher uniquement les événements clésVeuillez activer JavaScript pour utiliser cette fonctionnalitéFlux en directLes évènements clésil y a 49 minPréambuleAfficher uniquement les événements clésVeuillez activer JavaScript pour utiliser cette fonctionnalitéil y a 7 mois18h20 HNEToujours pas d'heure de départ officielle, soit dit en passant. Nous aurons une inspection du terrain par les arbitres dans 25 minutes, soit 10h45 heure locale. Ensuite, ils annonceront une heure de début ou une heure pour une autre inspection.il y a 24 mois18.03 HNECe que j'ai préféré hier, c'est que j'ai eu une conversation avec Glenn McGrath et certains des membres de sa fondation et des membres de sa famille en fin de journée, et ils étaient tous si optimistes malgré la pluie. Quoi qu'il en soit, leur collecte de fonds s'est très bien déroulée, alors qu'il y a quelques années, la structure du style de collecte de fonds aurait signifié que l'effort avait été durement touché. Plus de pouvoir à tous, ils font une grande chose. il y a 26 mois18.01 HNELa couverture de terrain se détache ! Comme un bas nonchalamment déroulé dans un film des années 1960. Arrête ça, diva des nitrates. il y a 27 min18h00 HNEAngus veut savoir ce que cela signifie pour l'Afrique du Sud si ce match est un match nul. «Pourraient-ils encore se qualifier pour la finale du Championnat du monde de test s'ils battaient les Windies à domicile et que les Australiens remportaient une victoire en série en Inde? Les Saffas voudraient-ils même se qualifier pour une autre raclée sur un terrain neutre ?Pour répondre d'abord à la dernière, bien sûr - vous ne pouvez pas gagner les matchs derrière vous, mais vous pouvez toujours renverser la vapeur dans le match à venir. Et oui - je ne suis pas un arithmétique né mais je pense qu'ils pourraient se qualifier en remportant leur prochain couple, sauf qu'ils auraient également besoin que l'Australie enlève beaucoup de peinture à l'Inde là-bas. Ce qui est peu probable mais possible.Voici les classement actuel si tu veux m'éclairer.il y a 32 mois17h55 HNENous avons eu des offres pour des sites de remplacement pour le test de Sydney hier. Tommy de Terrigal pense que sa ville est l'endroit idéal, même si ce n'est que près de Gosford. La pluie ne va-t-elle pas si loin au nord ?"Mat wicket joue donc toujours de manière cohérente", dit-il. "Six et l'océan sont sortis. Refroidissement de l'eau pour les quilleurs rapides et David Warner lors des chaudes journées chaudes. Lieu parfait. »il y a 35 mois17h52 HNEBeaucoup de gens au milieu en ce moment, des joueurs qui s'échauffent, courent, regardent la place du guichet, discutent paresseusement. Après une journée si calme hier, c'est une ruche d'activité. Nous ne commencerons pas à l'heure à 10h mais c'est en préparation. il y a 44 mois17h42 HNEQue s'est-il passé hier ? Pas grand-chose sur le terrain, mais cela influence la façon dont le reste du match pourrait être joué, et il s'est passé beaucoup de choses en dehors du terrain avec Pink Day collectant des fonds sur le terrain. Voici mon tour d'horizon.Beaucoup de perdants, mais l'Afrique du Sud moins mécontente après la pluie qui a emporté le troisième jour du test de SydneyLire la suiteil y a 46 mois17h41 HNELa meilleure nouvelle est qu'ils font tourner la machine à sopper et essaient d'absorber l'eau, et la pluie dans l'enceinte de Moore Park en particulier s'est arrêtée. Le processus commence à se préparer.il y a 49 min17h38 HNEPréambuleGeoff CitronHé là, vous les enfants fous. Qu'est-ce que c'est? Vous avez adoré lire sur la pluie pendant des heures hier et vous voulez le refaire aujourd'hui ? Eh bien. Ai-je le blog en direct pour vous. (C'est celui la.) Vous connaissez le bruit que font les pneus de voiture sur les routes quand tout est mouillé, par rapport au sec ? Ce genre de sifflement whoosh. C'est le premier bruit que j'ai entendu en me réveillant ce matin. Vous savez même du lit s'il pleut encore là-bas. Les flaques tremblent, la ville est trempée.

Mais – je sais que je l'ai dit parfois hier – le radar semble prometteur et j'espère que c'est juste la pluie du matin qui s'en va pour faire autre chose. Les sujetsCriquetÉquipe d'Australie de cricketÉquipe d'Afrique du Sud de cricketsport AustraliePlus de rapportsRéutiliser ce contenu

[canarycontessa]

[dancebang-blog]

[filmnoirfoundation]

NOIR CITY ANNUAL #13 $25

2021's NOIR CITY Annual 13, the best of the best from the Film Noir Foundation's 2020 NOIR CITY Magazine issues, is available now—essays, profiles, interviews, and appreciations of classic and modern noir films from today's top writers: Imogen Sara Smith, Jake Hinkson, Ray Banks, Christa Faust, Nora Fiore, Nick Feldman, Alan K. Rode, Steve Kronenberg, Brian Light, Sharon Knolle, Farran Smith Nehme, Danilo Castro, Ben Terrall, Ethan Iverson, Vince Keenan, and Eddie Muller. Book layout and design by Michael Kronenberg with an article by the designer on the celebrated comic writer Tom King. And, as with any purchase from the FNF, when you buy NOIR CITY Annual 13, you'll be helping fund the non-profit foundation's film restoration efforts.

BUY IT HERE

[noburden]

nighttime by megan hoagland / quiet light by the national / night windows by edward hopper / learn to trust by bad suns / night is my friend by molly drake / nic east / nighthawks by edward hopper / night light by unlike pluto / the nitrate diva / relentless / possession by sarah mclachlan / sleeping woman by raphael soyer

[forthegothicheroine]

I’m working on a podcast episode again! I’m trying! Here’s an excerpt:

One film you may have heard of, if only via the various remakes, is Mystery of the Wax Museum. The title is a bit of a lie- there’s no real mystery that the museum’s artist, played once again by Lionel Atwill, is up to no good. His original grand creations were destroyed by arson, and now he wants to rebuild his collection using real people beneath the wax, including King Kong’s costar Fay Wray. The only person who can stop him is a wisecracking, bootleg gin-drinking lady reporter, Florence, played by Glenda Farell. There’s nothing she won’t do to find out where and why people are disappearing, including casually asking a cop “How’s your sex life?” Nora Fiore on her blog The Nitrate Diva writes, “It says a lot about pre-Code Warner Brothers that the studio couldn’t even make a horror movie without throwing in a couple of wisecracking reporters, a coffin filled with bootleg hooch, and a junkie.” William Castle remade it as House of Wax with Vincent Price, and Dark Castle films remade it again with Paris Hilton (although sadly not in the role of the murderous artist.) I’ll probably see the Vincent Price version someday, but my spirit sags when I think of a lack of wisecracking lady reporters and bathtub gin.

[archive-archives]

COMING THE SECOND HALF OF NOVEMBER!

NEW 2020 1080p HD master from 4K scan of best surviving preservation elements LIBELED LADY (1936) Run Time: 98:00 Subtitles : English SDH Audio Specs: DTS HD-Master Audio 2.0 - English Aspect Ratio: RIGINAL ASPECT RATIO – 4x3-1.37:1 Product Color: B&W Disc Configuration: BD 50 SPECIAL FEATURES: Classic Short Subjects-KEYSTONE HOTEL (HD), NEW SHOES, M-G-M Cartoon-LITTLE CHEESER-Audio only LEO IS ON THE AIR Radio Promo-Original Theatrical Trailer (HD)

Four of Hollywood's greatest stars - William Powell, Jean Harlow, Myrna Loy and Spencer Tracy - reel in this whopper of a screwball romantic comedy classic nominated for a Best Picture Oscar®. It all starts when society diva Loy slaps newsman Tracy with a libel suit. Tracy enlists fiancée Harlow and down-on-his-luck Powell in a counter maneuver involving a rigged marriage, a phony seduction, a fabulously funny fishing scene, fisticuffs, broken promises and hearts - and, eventually, true love for all. This lady is one fine catch!

NEW 2020 1080p HD Restoration from 4K scan of the original nitrate Technicolor negatives THE PIRATE (1948) Run Time: 101:00 Subtitles: English SDH Audio Specs: DTS HD-Master Audio 2.0 - English Aspect Ratio: 1.37:1 4x3 FULL FRAME Product Color: COLOR Disc Configuration: BD-50 Special Features: Commentary by Author/Historian John Fricke, Making-of featurette “THE PIRATE: A MUSICAL TREASURE CHEST”, Vintage M-G-M short “You Can’t Win”, Vintage M-G-M cartoon “Cat Fishin’”, “MACK THE BLACK” musical sequence in HD with stereo audio, Audio-only outtakes, Associate Producer Roger Edens’ guide/rehearsal recordings, Judy Garland and Gene Kelly M-G-M radio promotional interviews, Original Theatrical Trailer (HD).

Judy Garland and Gene Kelly co-star in this dazzling Technicolor musical love story, set in the Caribbean during the early 19th century. The film is a showcase for director Vincente Minnelli’s dynamic use of Technicolor photography. A witty script from Albert Hackett and Frances Goodrich and a lively score of original songs by Cole Porter, result in a unique and unconventional entry into the canon of musicals produced at M-G-M by Arthur Freed during the studio’s golden era. Highlights of the film include Kelly and Minnelli’s ground-breaking “Pirate Ballet,” as well as two iterations of Porter’s “Be a Clown” - one featuring Kelly and the magnificent Nicholas Brothers (Fayard and Harold), and the finale performed by Kelly & Garland.

[sixohsixoheightfourtwo]

who likes comPLETEly wild 1940s technicolor noir films?? is that you?? Please in that case watch DESERT FURY, a totally bonkers 1947 melodrama set somewhere in nevada. The Nitrate Diva posted about it on twitter, saying it “must be seen to be believed” and I simply Cannot turn down such a recommendation.

in Desert Fury: the world’s oldest 19 yr old student Paula (Lizabeth Scott, who’s sort of lauren bacall-like) comes home to the desert town of ‘chuckawalla’ where her mother Fritzi (Mary Astor) runs casinos (and i think also brothels??). Meanwhile racketeer EDDIE BENDIX (budget clark gable john hodiak) and his ‘pal’ johnny (wendell corey) blow into town .... and Paula, for some reason, Falls In Luv or something with him. It’s based on a story by Ramona Stewart written for the glossy womens’ magazines when she was still in college. so you KNOW it’s gonna be OTT idfic.

On a formal level the actual best things about this are probably the Cinnamon Tography — glorious technicolor etc, actual location shooting in arizona, luridly bright — and the miklos rozsa score. Also Edith Head’s costumes: Lizabeth Scott gets approximately 9000 high-glam outfit changes; the film is clearly designed as a star vehicle for her.

on an INFORMAL level.... it is an amazingly weird ride.  Eddie turns out to be an old boyfriend of her mother Fritzi. Fritzi’s treatment of her daughter veers towards queasily pseudo-incestuous — calling Paula ‘baby’ all the time (UGH!), insisting Paula calls her by her first name, because ‘mother’ is ‘cold’ and not ‘companionable’. Burt Lancaster is ... also here, hating every second he’s in this film as Paula’s dumbass rodeo-champ-turned-cop love interest. (this was literally the second film he shot, he apparently thought it was total crap but had to do it as he was under contract. his best scenes tbh are with Mary Astor)  

Oh and Paula mysteriously resembles Eddie’s DEAD WIFE .... which is why he’s interested in her. And his wife died under Suspicious Circumstances. And people keep slapping each other in the face.

But also — eddie bendix and his pal johnny ryan .... are Gay. OK no, eddie is bisexual. Any time they’re in a scene together they’re framed together, presented as a duo. sometimes they are shirtless drinking tea together. they have lived and worked together for years and years. How did they meet? according to eddie.... johnny picked him up at 2am in times square: 

It was in the automat off Times Square about two o’clock in the morning on a Saturday. I was broke. He had a couple of dollars. We got to talking. He ended up paying for my ham and eggs… I went home with him that night… We were together from then on.

hello? hello??

ok so there’s a line about how there was a spare room at his mother’s boardinghouse or w/ever but it feels v much thrown in to appease censors. 

Paula and Eddie start their affair and there are some great scenes where johnny is initially apparently NOT threatened by eddie having a girlfriend... and then realises what’s up and tries to separate them. the tone is v much — I’m really just paraphrasing his dialogue here — johnny’s been with him for 15 years, he’s outlasted other women, women don’t want to know the Real Eddie, unlike johnny. johnny keeps calling eddie ‘good-looking’. It’s the 1940s and J and E are the Bad Guys ... so no spoilers but it doesn’t end well for them, altho Johnny is the most sympathetic character in this film and you can fight me about it. But for about 75 minutes you get so caught up in trying to figure out how this film has a functional gay couple that you forget the Hays Code exists.

There’s a clip on youtube of Eddie Muller (a critic who specialises in noir) introducing a screening of Desert Fury — he calls it “the gayest movie I have ever seen coming out of Hollywood in the 1940s . . . the relationship between John Hodiak and Wendell Corey in this film is sort of not to be believed”. He also has them at #2 on his list of “Film Noir’s Top 10 (Maybe) Gay Couples” (first is John Dall and Farley Granger in Rope — and they really WERE gay).

anyway there u have it. quarantimes film rec: DESERT FURY, 1947. I watched it on a second-hand spanish-language DVD because there’s no UK release. It's on dvd/bluray in the US. u can probably also find it thru... other channels idk I didn’t look

[mingethemerciless-blog]

The trials and tribulations of minge.

I’m a very scruffy person, when I was 13 I went through the usual teenage trial of having my teeth straightened, they had to take 4 molars out because they were pushing the others into such bizarre states of wonk that the orthodontist barely knew where to start.

I wore those badges of adolescent awkwardness for near enough two years. My friends all came out with american style smiles. Mine, although slightly straighter, remained resolutely, stereotypically british and scruffy.

Twenty years later I was walking at a smart pace down the track to the bus stop. I had washed and styled my hair, picked out an outfit which I hope said “responsible” and “in full control of her mental faculties” By necessity it included a slightly impractical maxi skirt, but I had learned over the years, that this was the best uniform for my current endeavour.

On the bus my reflection in the window told me that my luxuriant shiney bob had inexplicably flattened in places where I needed volume and frizzed up at the points where I had taken hours to smooth it out, the former gelam now looked distinctly greasy.

I fiddled nervously with my hair and the collar of my shirt until I arrived at the hospital.

This hospital is where I was born. Sitting at the top of a hill, it has one of the best views over the city that I have ever seen. I stared out of the window and almost calmed myself down, this might be the last chance I got to convince these people to help me...

My name was called, I shook the doctors hand.

“I hear you’ve been having some trouble with your periods” he understated.

Since the age of 23 I have been winning awards, if only in my own mind, for “worlds longest period” and “most blood lost without fatality.”

I launched into my unflinching and well practised description of the ping pong ball sized blood clots. The time one fell out of me in the shower and was so huge and heavy I was convinced I’d just given birth to an alien, I picked it up to check if it had a face, bits of it fell off and clogged the drain. I calmly recounted the years and years of seeping dread, the fact that I hadn’t gone swimming, worn white or finished a meal without a sickly slug of feroglobin in years.

I wasn’t scared any more, Cancer had suggested itself in my mind on and off for several years, but, as a nurse once blandly put it: “If it was cancer you’d be dead by now.”

My mind was throwing out tendrils of thought about my other dread. Pregnancy. When I was 18 I calmly accepted what I was told when I said I didn’t want children: 

“You’ll change your mind” they would say in a funny sing-song way.

 I’d probably want them when I was a proper adult, say, 25 years old.

25 came around, I was in no way a proper adult nor did I yet want children. No problem, there was plenty of time for me to want them, I’d just think about it a whole lot and then I’d want them.

30 came around, and I could no longer deny, the thought of pregnancy repulsed me. To be a host body to a parasitic bundle of flesh, to have my blood drawn away from me and into this other being. The idea of my cunt tearing open, a living thing coming out of me. A living thing with my weak jawline? With my scruffy hair? What if I didn’t love it? What if it turned out to be as intolerable a little shit as most of the children I’d ever met were? What if it grew up and went on being an intolerable little shit...come to think of it like most of the adults I’d ever met were?  What if, instead of doing something which changed the world for the better, it just became another consumer. Oh god what if it voted for Rees-Mogg? What if that apocalypse we’ve been promised actually happened and I had to raise an intolerable little shit in a cave whilst fighting off mutant tories and puerperal fever?

A more realistic and terrifying thought was never far from my conscious mind: What if I was raped? What if an abortion was too traumatic or, in the sadly likely event of an NHS sell off, too expensive? What if the current trends continue even further and an abortion was simply unavailable? Would I find someone clean and steady handed enough to do it on the kitchen table? Could I find the right hedgerow ingredients? Would I survive that?

“Do you want children?”

I was very glad that this came up.

“Definitely not, in fact I’d like to ask for a tubal ligation.”

“That won’t help with the bleeding”

“I know, it’s a separate issue, but I think it’s relevant…”

On the young man's face I saw faint hint of the bemused horror I’d seen on my GPs face when I had first asked, almost the beginning of a nervous laugh, although none had gone so far as to laugh at me yet…

My GP had looked at me the way teachers would look at me when I told them I’d lost my library card or forgotten my essay. Faux shock, the kindly-meant disappointment of a grandparent seeing you make a youthful blunder. His voice had come out with just the merest subtle hint of a condescending laugh in it when he told me he could refer me to a specialist but it was unlikely they’d give “someone like you” such a “drastic” operation.

Someone like me? Scruffy? Irresponsible? Disorganised? 

And how was maintaining my personal status quo drastic? Surely having to fire a fully dependant, sapient life out of my pelvis was far more drastic than just...carrying on as I was?

In any event, none of the appointments that GP had made had referenced my desire to get the snip, almost as if he didn’t even write it on the request he sent...

The current gynaecologist shook off the uncanny look he had given me for asking the forbidden question and asked if he could “scan me” Oh great, another date with the dildo-cam…

I’ve had this scan done so many times, my cervix is directly connected to the pain centers of the brain, one mere prod and all hell breaks loose in my nerves, it’s no good telling doctors this, they adhere rigidly to the “some women experience discomfort” school of thought.

The young nurse was wonderful, allowing me to squeeze her hand when the probe swept over my diva of a cervix and white stars of agony danced on the ceiling above me.

“You have a very large ectropion on your cervix, it’s probably causing a lot of the bleeding”

“Yes, I’ve been told that many times…”

“Hmm, we could get rid of this ectropion with silver nitrate, it might help stop the bleeding?”

Holy shit, you mean there was a way to get rid of that thing all along?!

I consented as calmly as I could.

The next thing I knew he was jabbing my insides with chemical soaked lollipop sticks, but I was more than willing for this to happen after 10 years of inaction and casual shrugs at my wayward cervix.

I was told to brace myself for “gritty discharge” as bits of burnt cervix dropped out of me along with all the other nonsense going on down there.

Later, pants back on, veins blossoming with green bruising from the “hormone level” blood tests, my innards were laid out in bland yet descriptive medical descriptions.

My womb had a “septum” which immediately made me think that it had a face, a scornful, angry face I would dearly love to punch for the years of ruined underwear, bedsheets and dates.

My right ovary was polycystic,

“This can lead to diabetes and heart disease later in life so you’ll have to be wary of gaining weight…”

My body type is made up of circles, I have rounded hips, boobs, thighs and face, when I was younger I worried briefly that I was chubby, but I was active and I ate well, I could still see my ribs and I could power walk up the hill to my house without so much as a sweat. I gave the doctor a blank look, he still hadn’t discussed my tubal options yet...

The doctor now took on a slightly lower, more cautious tone, evidently more scared of upsetting me with this next information than he had been by talking about my weight.

“You may find it slightly harder to get pregnant...but it’s by no means impossible”

I did a double take. 

“...That’s really not a problem for me...what with the tubal ligation request and all…” I hinted cheerfully.

He made a neutral sound and moved on with a list of my uterine shortcomings.

My left ovary was “very mobile” (my mind gave it a beard and a bindle stick) and showed some evidence of endometriosis.

“I’ve never had any symptoms of that…”

“Again this can lead to some minor complications in conception and pregnancy…”

Was I speaking klingon? Was I mispronouncing “tubal ligation”? Was IVF so much cheaper than the lady snip that they’d rather I reproduced despite my clear desire not to do so and regret an actual living human?

“You have some signs that there may be polyps in your uterus, that’s not harmful but they may be contributing to the bleeding, in which case, we can remove them.”

I was booked in for a hysteroscopy, which sounded painful in spite of the “some women experience discomfort” platitude, and a review in 3 months time.

“Do you have any questions?”

I took a deep breath, I knew this was a separate issue but I had to bring this up whenever I could because there was no obvious way to request it otherwise.

“How do I go about getting the tubal ligation?”

The look of horror came back, much stronger this time, the poor sod had run out of things to distract me with, his face turned to a look of utter defeat.

“I wouldn’t even consider doing that until you had exhausted all other contraceptive options and had fertility counselling, have you considered the mirena coil? It’s progesterone only and most women find it very good…”

My mind flashed back to the last “progesterone only” treatment I’d had: Migraines had hidden the worst of the symptoms for the best part of 6 months, by the time they were under control again the real problem became tragically apparent. My sex drive was so low that I could barely tolerate a hug, in desperation I had the little plastic rod dug out of my arm with a scalpel, but my libido never fully recovered, don’t try telling me the effects aren’t permanent…

A further flashback to the copper coil. The way it dug itself into the side of my womb, the way it hurt, exactly how much and how long it hurt for, How there had been no one in my local GP surgery willing to remove it for me (grab the string and pull, I refuse to believe that this requires a specialist qualification on top of medical training.) The serious thought I gave to yanking it out myself, only stopping when the prospect of a torn cervix put me off. 

A rich history of contraceptive pills danced through my brain, mood swings, swollen boobs and most memorably a migraine so bad that I called NHS Direct and was told to monitor myself for signs of a potentially fatal brain haemorrhage...

The time they’d tried to stop the bleeding with anti-inflammatories and discovered my allergy to this group of medications when I broke out in a measles style rash.

Those memories don’t blur with time, at least they haven’t yet.

“Statistics show that you would regret being sterilized, you don’t have a family”

For a brief second my imagination took me to an episode of The Twilight Zone. I don’t have a family? Shit! What happened to them? My siblings? My partner? My parents? My friends?

The anger when I realised what he really meant seeped through my mind like a blood clot through a pad.

“You don’t share DNA with anyone who came out of you therefore you have no family”

“You haven’t had to push your family with your pelvic floor therefore they don’t count”

“If you eventually decide to adopt that won’t count either”

“Everyone you currently live with, love and rely on will reject and abandon you because you didn’t give birth to them.”

Blood clots, along with anger of that magnitude tend to flood the sanitary pad or mind.

Luckily, I have had years of practise at crossing my legs and trying to discreetly aim my crotch at the driest part of the pad. This, in effect, was how I ordered my mind at that moment.

“Don’t yell at NHS people, they have enough problems. The poor man was just working off a script, of course they have to be careful, one litigious malcontent could set these heroes back years…”

I left, with no clearer an idea of how to get my tubes tied and no idea why this was the first time, cysts, polyps and septums had been discovered after so many tests over so many years.

Back home I attempted to find out how much private hospitals charged for tubal ligation. “Anywhere between $700 and $10,000 depending on your insurance provider”  ecosia informed me in very american and somewhat unhelpful terms.

An inquiry to Spire healthcare yielded an unapologetic result of £3000, that’s a lot of minimum wage hours and late rent payments, besides £200 of that was for a consultation in which they might refuse me anyway. 

I wondered if those places in Turkey where they do cheap facelifts might consider my case...Would having scalpels jabbed into me in a country where I couldn’t speak the language followed by a cramped and cheap flight be more or less unbearable than a kitchen table abortion? Either way the word “botched” was never far from my mind.

When the day came for my hysteroscopy I steeled myself for another try. The gynaecologist was a lovely, calm young woman with curly hair. She spent a long time reassuring me that I was in control and could stop the procedure at any time. She told me that she would take a biopsy from my womb lining in addition to shoving a camera up where no camera had gone before. She showed me the camera. I wish she hadn’t.

“See, it’s very small.”

It was slightly smaller than a pencil. Small compared to a baby maybe. But I knew exactly how big that thing was going to feel in my stupid nervy cervix. Turns out I was wrong.

It was far bigger and far sharper and far more white hot than I thought possible. 

The nurses squeezed my hand and told me it would be over soon.

I never stopped her, I wanted this done, I wanted to know what the hell was wrong with me. I wanted to show what a good patient I was, how in control of my mind and body I was, how I would take the responsibility of dealing with sterilization without regret...

I learned just how exponential pain can be.

When someone said “This will take another five seconds” I discovered how long five seconds can feel.

I found out, to my displeasure, that passing out does not necessarily stop you feeling pain, it simply stops you moving. I learned just how wonderful the overworked and underpaid folks of the NHS really are when they brought me water and later tea and let me sit in a comfy chair and shake without telling me that they needed me to get a grip and move on because they had a full waiting room…

The results were discussed with me. There were no polyps, there was no septum, what's more, my womb was perfectly shaped to receive a mirena coil…

Sterilization wouldn’t stop the bleeding, it was a separate issue. The mirena would stop the bleeding and stop any pregnancy. Sure I’d have to have it ripped out of the most sensitive, nerve rich part of me and then stuffed back in broadside first every three years, assuming I hadn’t emigrated and the NHS was still there that is. And the progesterone might...exacerbate certain things, but that would probably settle down...

 I sighed, drained my tea and smoothed down my faithful maxi skirt. 

Alright uterus, you don’t like me and I don’t like you, but it looks like we’re in this together. Here’s another burning hoop for us to jump through, lets give these folks the show they’ve been waiting for...

[inapat14]

La Chanson du coeur (Onchoudet el-Fouad) a relevant example of the AMAR Foundation essential part

Onchoudet el-Fouad, made by Mario Volpe in 1932 is considered as the first Egyptian talkie. The film takes its name from the main song composed for the occasion with the lyrics written by the poet Khalil Moutran.

This new type of musical and dancing film gathered the biggest stars of both music and theater stages. Among others, the main female character is played by Nadra, a well-known singer from the Cairo. This sound production was the first of many to come as we count more than 225 Egyptian musical films until the 60’s. Such as Nadra, this flourishing genre in the 30’s revealed lots of female icons such as Oum Kalsoum and Mounira al-Mahdiya. If you’re interested in the topic, there is the stunning exhibition « Divas » at the Arab world Institute, Paris, about the female Arab artists and icons. It’s up until September 26th 2021 and you should really see it!

But now let’s get back to Onchoudet el-Fouad. The film had already been saved in 2001 by the Cinémathèque française from the original nitrate negative in its collections. However, this last known copy is incomplete and damaged. It was digitally restored in the 2010’s by two French laboratories : Vectracom and Hiventy. In 2012, they were supposed to screen it at the Cairo Opera House as a tribute to Zakaria Ahmed who composed part of the music for the film, but this event was cancelled due to political tensions in Egypt.

Lots of sound extracts desapeared, such as the main song, but it was found in 2008 on a 78 rpm Shellac disc by the Foundation for the Archiving and Research for Arab Music (ARAM). Since this version is different from the original one, its cadence has been slightly modified so that the voice of Nadra is synchronized with the image.

AMAR Foundation, Qurnet el-Hamra Village, Metn District, Lebanon

AMAR is a Lebanese foundation committed to the preservation and dissemination of traditional Arab music. They own 7,000 records as well as 6,000 recordings on reel. Most of their collection is from the « Nahda » era that started in 1903 and goes until 1935. AMAR specifically aims at promoting overshadowed women voices and forgotten great masters through studio recordings as well as live concerts. This great initiative launched in 2009 wants to preserve the unknown heritage of Lebanon, Syria, Palestine, Iraq, the Gulf and the Maghreb but also from local ethnic groups such as Kurdish, Syriac or Coptic. Their website is full of educational ressources about the Arab traditional music history, with photographs, recordings and documentation. You should definitely take a look at it!

AMAR Foundation website : https://www.amar-foundation.org/data/artists-and-music/

Coralie

Online ressources :

https://www.cinematheque.fr/article/38.html

https://www.imarabe.org/fr/expositions/divas-arabes

[howardhawkshollywood]

Howard Hawks' early career

Howard Hawks’ early career

Mary Pickford in The Little American (1917)

Thanks to the nitrate diva for this and all her other silent gifs

https://nitratediva.tumblr.com/

[filmnoirfoundation]

Here's a peek inside the current issue of NOIR CITY e-magazine! Imogen Smith's cover story gives an incisive look at the life and films of writer José Giovanni ("Le Trou", "Classe tous risques", and "Le deuxième souffle"). Also, in this issue, John Wranovics interviews actor-writer-director Edward Norton about his new film "Motherless Brooklyn", and Jake Hinkson gives an insightful comparison of that film's source novel to Norton's finished film. We also have essays by two new contributors, Farran Smith Nehme and Nora Fiore, exceptional cinephiles known in the Twitter-sphere as, respectively, "The Self-Styled Siren" and "The Nitrate Diva".

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