A History Of Advertising

A History Of Advertising, by Stephane Pincas and Marc Loiseau, presents a history of advertising from 1842 (the founding of the world's first advertising agency, in Philadelphia) to 2006 (when this book was first published, titled Born In 1842).

The emphasis is on images, with each page containing several colour reproductions of posters and stills from TV commercials. This is in contrast to Mark Tungate's Adland, which contains almost no photographs at all. The text in A History Of Advertising amounts to little more than extended picture captions, however, and the advertisements included are all American, British, or (occasionally) European, so the scope is not really international. There is an impressive bibliography, though.

The book was originally published privately by the advertising agency Publicis, and this new commercial edition is published by Taschen. The many Publicis references in the text feel too self-congratulatory, and should have been removed for this edition. I'd been hoping for a long time that either Taschen or Laurence King would produce a book such as this, and it is certainly the best available, if not the best possible, historical survey of advertising images.

The 100 Best Films Of The World

The 100 Best Films Of The World: A Journey Through A Century Of Motion-Picture History, was edited by Manfred Leier. (Intriguingly, Leier is not named anywhere on the cover or spine, and the introduction is signed simply "The Editor", with Leier identified only on the copyright page.)

The book consists of 100 films, arranged "according to the film director's country of origin". Thus, for example, Psycho (made in Hollywood) is listed in the Europe section, because Alfred Hitchcock was born in England. Oddly, One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest appears in the North America list despite Milos Forman being Czech by birth. There are two pages devoted to each of the 100 films, each film represented by plot synopses and glossy stills. The detailed synopses are too spoiler-ridden for those who have not yet seen the films and redundant for those who already have.

North America

• Greed
  
• The General
  
• All Quiet On The Western Front
  
• Gone With The Wind
  
• The Grapes Of Wrath
  
• Citizen Kane
  
• Casablanca
  
• Sunset Blvd
  
• High Noon
  
• From Here To Eternity
  
• On The Waterfront
  
• Rebel Without A Cause
  
• Some Like It Hot
  
• Ben-Hur: A Tale Of The Christ
  
• Breakfast At Tiffany's
  
• Easy Rider
  
• The Godfather
  
• One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest
  
• Star Wars IV: A New Hope
  
• Annie Hall
  
• Saturday Night Fever
  
• ET: The Extra-Terrestrial
  
• Blade Runner
  
• Out Of Africa
  
• Pretty Woman
  
• Pulp Fiction
  
• The Matrix
  
• Lost In Translation
  
• Titanic

Europe

• Belle De Jour
  
• All About My Mother
  
• The Rules Of The Game
  
• Children Of Paradise
  
• The Wages Of Fear
  
• M. Hulot's Holiday
  
• Black Orpheus
  
• Breathless
  
• Last Year At Marienbad
  
• Au Revoir Les Enfants
  
• Amelie
  
• La Strada
  
• La Dolce Vita
  
• Blow-Up
  
• Once Upon A Time In The West
  
• Death In Venice
  
• Last Tango In Paris
  
• Life Is Beautiful
  
• Zorba The Greek
  
• Yol
  
• All Night Long
  
• The Assault
  
• Character
  
• Metropolis
  
• The Blue Angel
  
• M
  
• Ninotchka
  
• The Tin Drum
  
• The Marriage Of Maria Braun
  
• Fitzcarraldo
  
• Wings Of Desire
  
• The Lacemaker
  
• Closely Observed Trains
  
• Kolya
  
• The Shop On Main Street
  
• Mephisto
  
• Time Of The Gypsies
  
• Ashes & Diamonds
  
• Dance Of The Vampires
  
• The Pianist
  
• Names In Marble
  
• Battleship Potemkin
  
• The Cranes Are Flying
  
• Andrei Rublev
  
• Lights In The Dust
  
• Wild Strawberries
  
• Autumn Sonata
  
• As It Is In Heaven
  
• Babette's Feast
  
• Breaking The Waves
  
• City Lights
  
• The Great Dictator
  
• The Third Man
  
• The Bridge On The River Kwai
  
• Psycho
  
• Lawrence Of Arabia
  
• Goldfinger
  
• A Hard Day's Night
  
• Dr Zhivago
  
• A Clockwork Orange
  
• Gandhi

Asia

• The Wind Will Carry Us
  
• Mother India
  
• Monsoon Wedding
  
• Rashomon
  
• The Seven Samurai
  
• Raise The Red Lantern
  
• Farewell My Concubine

Australasia

• The Piano
  
• The Lord Of The Rings I-III

The list includes no examples of Neo-Realism or Film Noir, and no films by DW Griffith, Martin Scorsese, Howard Hawks, or Yasujiro Ozu. Note that Ben-Hur is the William Wyler remake and that Titanic is the James Cameron version.

4th Project 6

Project 6, a film and photography exhibition, will be hosted by Gallery VER, Bangkok, next month. The event will include the short film Action! (premiered at the 5th Bangkok Experimental Film Festival) by Thunska Pansittivorakul, whose photographic exhibition, Life Show, is currently on display at VER. The 4th Project 6 will open on 15th August (the day Life Show closes), and will run until 30th August.

Baltic outraging public decency?

An installation by Terence Koh, Gone Yet Still, may result in criminal charges against the Baltic art gallery. Koh's work, a statuette of a tumescent Jesus, was shown earlier this year, and, in a private prosecution, a member of the public has accused the gallery of outraging public decency. Gone Yet Still also attracted controversy when it was shown in 2005, and a similar Koh sculpture, Medusa, was withdrawn by the Saatchi Gallery in 2006. Baltic came under fire last year for a Nan Goldin photograph, though the image was eventually cleared of obscenity.

Life Show

Life Show, an exhibition of photographs by Thunska Pansittivorakul, opened today at Gallery VER in Bangkok, and will run until 15th August. (The same venue hosted a retrospective of Thunska's films earlier this year.) The exhibition includes portraits, behind-the-scenes images, and some 'X'-rated shots. Life Show is also the title of one of Thunska's short films, in which an actor discusses his sex-life. Thunska's photos can also be seen, as a slideshow, in his film Endless Story.

Stanley Kubrick's Boxes

As part of the Kubrick Season on More4 this month, Jon Ronson presented (and directed) Stanley Kubrick's Boxes on 15th July, a True Stories documentary about Kubrick's archives. Ronson examined the boxes (designed to Kubrick's specifications) containing the director's notes, photographs, and props in situ at Childwickbury Manor, near St Albans, before they were transferred to the Stanley Kubrick Archive at the University of the Arts in London. The programme includes a short Lolita screen test featuring Sue Lyon, and footage filmed by Vivian Kubrick on the set of Full Metal Jacket.

The English Roses & Madonna autograph

The English Roses features two children's books by Madonna, The English Roses and its sequel (Too Good To Be True) in a box set limited to 1,500 copies. The set also includes a letter autographed by Madonna and a print signed by the illustrator, Stacy Peterson. Madonna's autograph in this set is genuine, though it's more of a hasty scrawl than a proper signature.

The English Roses: Too Good To Be True

Too Good To Be True is the sequel to The English Roses, Madonna's first children's book. The central character, Binah, is broadly autobiographical (Binah says: "my mother [...] died when I was little", just as Madonna's mother did). The theme (jealousy) is interesting, though the moral could be more subtle. The illustrations are by Stacy Peterson (who can draw female characters but not males).

Sweets feature heavily, with one of the characters being called Candy Darling (named after the Andy Warhol acolyte) and one page being decorated with drawings of assorted candies - a theme which would later develop into the album Hard Candy and its title track, Candy Shop.

Teeth

Teeth, directed by Mitchell Lichtenstein, is a blackly funny horror film about a teenager with a vagina dentata. Once she discovers her 'mutation', she uses it to castrate the various male chauvinists who seem to populate her life. Her brother is a ridiculously over-the-top stereotype, though the other characters are all believable. The central character herself is sympathetic throughout 99% of the film, though her femme fatale smile in the final shot is out of character.

Yongyuth verdict upheld

The Election Commission's guilty verdict against Yongyuth Tiyaphairat has been reaffirmed by the Supreme Court. The Court's decision was announced a few minutes ago.

The Supreme Court is Thailand's highest legal authority, and its decision in this case has potentially explosive consequences for the government. Yongyuth has been found guilty of election fraud (specifically, vote-buying) and, because he was a PPP executive member at the time, the PPP faces dissolution and its executives face five-year bans on all political activity.

The PPP was formed as a result of the dissolution of its former incarnation, Thaksin's TRT last year. Now, the PPP itself faces the same fate, Prime Minister Samak may be banned from politics, and a general election may be necessary. Non-executive PPP members will presumably form another new party, though whether they will receive the continued support of their coalition partners remains to be seen.

PAD's anti-democratic 'New Politics'

The PAD, currently orchestrating demonstrations in Bangkok against Samak, has proposed a 'New Politics' solution to Thailand's political crisis (a crisis caused in no small part by the PAD, of course).

Unfortunately, and unsurprisingly, the New Politics concept is totally undemocratic. The plan is for only 30% of MPs to be elected, with the majority being nominated representatives. Furthermore, conditions permitting military intervention have been outlined: a military overthrow of the government is 'appropriate' if the civilian government does not prosecute those charged with lese majeste, if the government is incompetent or corrupt, and if the government acts against the monarchy.

Their criteria for validating a military takeover are vague, lenient, and misguided. In any case, there should be no circumstances under which military intervention is ever 'acceptable'. Their plan to elect only 30% of MPs has only been proposed because the PAD knows that TRT/PPP will comfortably win any general election in the near future.

If they really want to position themselves as the saviours of the nation and the King, why don't the PAD form a political party and stand as candidates at the next election? Probably because their public support doesn't extend beyond a few thousand (presumably unemployed) loyalists?

Art Monthly Australia criticised

Art Monthly Australia magazine has been criticised by Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd after it printed a photograph of a nude child on this month's cover. The photograph was published in protest at the closure of a Bill Henson exhibition (which was subsequently cleared of obscenity last month).

The cover photo shows six-year-old Olympia Nelson posing in front of a painted landscape; it was taken by the girl's mother, Polixeni Papapetrou. The magazine now faces losing the state funding it receives.

The Kubrick Files

Today, The Sunday Telegraph (UK) newspaper's Home & Living section has a four-page supplement called The Kubrick Files. It includes extracts from Kubrick's correspondence, taken from the Stanley Kubrick Archive.

Stanley Kubrick Season

More4, a UK digital TV channel owned by Channel 4, will show a season of Kubrick's films this month, as well as a new documentary about his archives on 15th July. (This is the third Kubrick season organised by Channel 4: the first was broadcast in June 1996, and the second in September 1999.)

The Art Of Time

Gaysorn, a shopping mall in downtown Bangkok, is hosting an exhibition titled The Art Of Time.

The exhibition is designed to promote Gaysorn's range of expensive watches, though of primary interest are works by Pablo Picasso, Claude Monet, Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Henri Matisse, Salvador Dali, and other marquee-name artists.

The centrepiece is a bronze sculpture by Dali, a 3-D representation of his melting clock, a motif he first used in his 1931 painting The Persistence Of Memory. The sculpture was cast in 1980, in a limited edition of 500. (The massively over-rated Dali famously signed piles of reproductions, and even blank canvasses, each morning during breakfast, boasting that "I like to start the day by earning $20,000" and living up to the anagram, 'avida dollars', coined by Andre Breton.)

Most of the other works on display are signed prints. The 1963 Picasso linocut, La Dame A La Collerette, for example, was produced in an edition of fifty. The Dali clock sculpture is the only direct link to the exhibition's title, with the other works having no discernible connections.

The Art Of Time opened yesterday, and will close on 20th July.

youtube.com blocked by TOT

TOT, the Thai state-owned ISP, is currently blocking every youtube.com video. The website itself is unblocked, but any attempt to access a video results in a black screen and an apology: "We're sorry, this video is no longer available".

The videos are available, of course; the message is simply a smokescreen to hide the fact that they are being blocked. The message should be extended to: 'This video is no longer available to anyone unfortunate enough to have a TOT internet account'.

(The entire youtube.com site was blocked by all Thai ISPs in May last year, and finally unblocked last August.)

Metropolis: complete print discovered

A complete print of Fritz Lang's Metropolis has been discovered at the Museo del Cine in Buenos Aires. The full-length version, which premiered in 1927 at over three hours long, had previously been considered lost.

There have been various attempts to restore the film over the years, the most successful being the 2001 Murnau-Stiftung version, though even that superb edition represented only 75% of the original footage. Archivists had given up all hope of ever finding the missing 25%.

The complete print discovered in Buenos Aires is in 16mm, and, as the photographs indicate, its condition is not exactly pristine. However, the fact that a complete version exists, in any condition, is a revelation. A new Murnau-Stiftung restoration, incorporating the Buenos Aires footage, has already been initiated.

Wilders charged; Wilders acquitted

Today, Geert Wilders was charged with anti-Islamic blasphemy by a Jordanian court, following the online release of his inflammatory film Fitna earlier this year. Wilders faces three years in prison, and may be arrested by Interpol if he leaves his home country, the Netherlands. Yesterday, however, Dutch prosecutors acquitted Wilders of all domestic charges filed against him.

Xiao Yun photos: not on Thai sites

Thai webmasters have been warned by the police that they will face prosecution if they post pictures of Xiao Yun online. Xiao Yun is a young Chinese lady who has performed a sponsored online striptease to raise money for victims of the Chinese earthquake earlier this year. Many Thai websites (with the notable exceptions of telewizmall.com and madoo.com) have indeed refrained from posting the racier Xiao Yun images.