Dream Conversations

mostly conversations in fiction / non-fiction / films curated by Mariel, a 23 y/o teacher, workshop facilitator, cinephile. Interests include psychology, arts & culture, entrepreneurship

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Ticket of No Return

A solitary woman purchases a one-way ticket to Berlin to indulge her  greatest passion—binge drinking—in Ulrike Ottinger’s flamboyantly  provocative classic of New German Cinema.    

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Ticket of No Return

A solitary woman purchases a one-way ticket to Berlin to indulge her greatest passion—binge drinking—in Ulrike Ottinger’s flamboyantly provocative classic of New German Cinema.  

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Blood Rider

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Sisterhood

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Sisterhood

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Sisterhood

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Sisterhood

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Sisterhood

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Don't you wish you dialed it back a bit? I wish my all life I had but we're all unique. All of us were the sperm united with the egg. You're obligated to make what you are. I wanted Apocalypse Now to be about morality. The youth were told to shoot to kill but were not allowed to write "fuck" on the plane dashboard.

Tribeca Talks: Francis Ford Coppola and Steven Soderbergh

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From Akira Kurosawa’s Seven Samurai (1954).

This clip is from a short film “The Stories That Prepared Us“ by Now You See It. It is “a telling of the story of the Coronavirus through moments in critically-acclaimed film and television.” It even had a clip from Osmosis Jones!

We live in an unprecedented time. In moments of change like this one, it helps to look to our favorite stories for ways to cope. Let’s see how film helps us understand what it means to be alone, how to hold leaders accountable, and what we can do to protect one another.

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Listening to Diego Luna and Guillermo del Toro, as well as seeing films from the Guadalajara Film Festival got me interested in Mexican films other than Y tu mamá también and Pan’s Labyrinth. To be honest a couple of short films horrified me (The Cats, Cerulia). And I had to see them at night because the premiere is in the wee hours of the morning where I live!

Sharing my notes while listening to his interview below:

What he said about the difference between this online film festival and everyday film streaming service is true. There is a sense of community here as we saw the films premiering for the first time online together... unlike streaming and then just exchanging views with people in the same room, or our own circles on social media, the whole world became our community. Thank you for organizing this! And hopefully, this will be the first of many :) I also agree that this time has given us the opportunity to see the truth of who we are. It’s like a lens through which we can see what we’ve built in terms of community, in terms of how we communicate... it’s a chance to reflect who we want to be in the future. How are we gonna relate to the planet we live in? How are we gonna tell stories? How are we gonna raise our kids? He spent his life going somewhere, to festivals around the world, connecting with the audience and now he had to stay at home with family, the space he created and actually look at the window, find the reason to look out the window. Life is about simplicity. We try to cover so much ground and access everything. To be honest, for Diego Luna, happiness is not there. This experience (pandemic is showing us that) Happiness may be in the everyday moments we spend with our loved ones at home. “I have really happy moments with my kids every day.” And even this is a privilege. Not everyone have the comfort of a home, being with loved ones... confinement is not the same for everyone. There’a fear and anxiety because he was trying to let go of what he was and what his goals were before, but there’s beauty in what we’re living. Sometimes we need cinema to help us digest what is happening.

Directors to look into: Alfonso cuaron Alejandro Iñarritu Diego Luna Guillermo Del Toro Everybody is so focused on shooting, the companies can’t afford to have 5-10 projects in development. Once you start, you have to finish it. We don’t give the projects enough time to come to reality in the best possible way/ for development. This confinement is forcing us to spend time with our projects. Right now we are shaping how platforms are being used! What’s popular or not Films as therapy for Diego on a personal level As an actor, different perspectives at different stages in life He recommends filmmaking as a profession because it involves an introspective process that he believes is necessary for everyone. My life: films as therapy, connection with other people, teachers, peers all over the world—As parents, friends. My lifetime isn’t so exciting but it’s my job to resolve pain in my past. My grandparents and parents worked hard so I can enjoy an easygoing life compared to what they had. I enjoy art, I learn about enterprises, I explore spirituality and how to find inner peace so I don’t relive and cause the mental and emotional trauma.

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This is how it feels like with all that’s been happening the past 3 months. I’ve been working from home since March, and our management had extended the setup until the end of August. I’m grateful for the free time this has given me to read not just news but also for leisure. It has made my workday more efficient--less bathroom breaks and pacing myself so I don’t run out of things to do before I have to time out, for fear of being judged if I finished early and just lounge around, waiting for the end of my shift. I can spend more time in bed, less time at my work desk. If it’s not for the crippled economy, limited mobility, and general feeling of anxiety from governments (and even certain “leftist” groups in my country) taking advantage of the pandemic to fatten their pockets and forward political interests, I‘d say 2020 is a step forward--for mental health, for management, for the environment.

If you came here for the film screenshots, I’d be uploading some from the We Are One Global Film Festival.

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Michael Sweeney, the director of the Metropolitan Center for C.B.T., a Manhattan clinic for anxiety disorders, treats patients of all ages. In his view, it’s important for therapists “not to be in the reassurance business.” If the therapist becomes a weekly source of reassurance, the patient is encumbered, not “empowered.” Sweeney’s favorite therapeutic devices are simple: he asks patients to think up “headlines” (what is the most important takeaway of the day?) and “letters” (what would a true friend say to you about what’s happening?).

The New Theatrics of Remote Therapy

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Many of us are now feeling a pull to connect with someone from our past. After all, you can be around people all day — children, spouses, roommates — and still feel lonely. You might be missing your most intimate relationships, your fun acquaintances and the communities you belong to that bring out certain sides of your personality.

Should You Reach Out to a Former Friend Right Now?

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So much of the news is ongoing and unsettled, but obituaries by definition have a kind of alluring finality. The best of them read like short stories, introducing us to memorable characters and confronting us, in ways that can range from amusing to moving, with the diversity of human experience. All this helps explain why so many readers have been drawn to the obituary section during the coronavirus pandemic, finding in its swelling pages some of what has been missing from everyday life: an intimate connection with other people. It is the tragic version of what life on its best days used to offer us, chance encounters with strangers and the joyful serendipity of learning a little about their lives. But, of course, these growing obituary sections also quantify the fear we all feel, and the grief that is creeping closer to all of us.

Telling the Stories of the Dead Is Essential Work