Genius. Picasso.

Feeble series; even feebler than the last series about Einstein. The Einstein series leaving aside his science after c. 1919, were, at least, livened by the incomparable Geoffrey Rush (though, great and underrated Emily Watson was not given much of a go). But Picasso series, incoherent as they are, left his artistic development together with the brilliant Alex Rich, playing young Picasso. The rest of the series are only concerned with his womanizing, solid, but no match to the current President of the Unites States.

Love, Vincent

This is a genial animation with final days of Van Gogh reconstructed from his numerous letters and positioned as a whodunit story with the implied suspicion that Van Gogh was murdered, rather than committed suicide, ostensibly by good-for-nothing teenagers he befriended in his drunken roaming. But: the movie making technique where the characters are played by the human actors and then reanimated by drawing bears its descent from an unwatchable but equally genial "Waking Life" by Linklatter.

Russia, the Motherland of Abstract Expressionism?

It is widely surmised that artistic experimentation in USSR had mostly ended with state takeover of the artistic unions, some time in late 1920s and the rest was a belated imitation of the Western artistic movements. But the case continued...

Here I present images of the Russian Abstract Expressionists, who were most active in 1950s or early 1960s, i.e. simultaneously with Pollock and Rothko in the US, and Dubuffet and Wols in Europe.

Ely Bielutin (1925-2012)

Evgenii Mikhnov-Voitenko (1932-1988); but his most innovative work has been done in 1950s

Evgenii Kropivnitskii (1893-1979)

Yakov Chernikhov (1889-1951).

Yakov Chernikhov is better known as an architect and even better--as a designer of fantastic architectural-themed paintings. But his purely abstract output was also significant, though it was closer to Malevich's Suprematism than to the Abstract Expressionism of the fifties.

Tatiana Glebova (1900-1985)

Tatiana Glebova was a relative and a student of Pavel Filonov, the genius. Most of her output was figurative but Thyssen-Bornemissa collection includes some of her Abstract Expressionist work. 

Pavel Zaltsman (1912-1985)

(See the comment)

                                           
 P. Zaltsman

                                   

P. Filonov. Pedagogic. 

The darkest hour

Oscar-bound movie with a primitive plot. Gary Oldman is brilliant and totally believable in imitating Churchill's physicality but that's about it. Kennedy once quipped: "What is private is policy. What is public is propaganda." The movie substitutes Churchill's patriotic speeches and corny flag-waving scenes, probably invented, for his political maneuvers and shenanigans. His refusal to negotiate with Adolf is cursorily explained in the movie "you don't negotiate with a lion having your head in his mouth" but this line is never bolstered by cinematic means.

In fact, Churchill was not a naive fulminating every time his German counterpart was mentioned but a very practical politician who lived through German trashing of Munich agreements (which he supported), attacking Poland and kidnapping British intelligence personnel from then neutral Holland (Venlo Incident), which could have impressed him more than the two previous episodes. Nor was he a passionate anti-Nazi--after the WWII he contributed to the legal defense of Nazi war criminals in British custody.  He simply understood that if Adolf disregarded all previous agreements and understandings--probably a generic feature of German diplomacy from Friedrich II to Merkel--he will not stop now with victory seemingly in his grasp.

The Shape of Water by Guillermo del Toro

Good. Sally Hawkins is magnificent and the cast (Spencer, Shannon, Stuhlbarg, etc.) is very good but Guillermo del Toro becomes lazy. Could not he find people with genuine Russian pronunciation in New York City? Michael Stuhlbarg's character could be given another bio as, e.g. an Austrian communist to explain his accent. Soviet spies meet with their agent at an abandoned construction site, yet inexplicably come to his apartment in full view of the minders. Michael Shannon, a supposed top intelligence professional shoots an important agent instead of arresting and presenting him to the superiors. Less dramatic but more in-style conclusion would be if Michael Shannon presented a top Soviet agent to the general and was subsequently buried as hero among the accolades, while Hawkins and Doug Jones unite in a passionate embrace under the waves. These are, of course, details but details distinguish a good movie from great.

All the money in the world

Solid, well organized movie. Christopher Plummer as an inscrutable psychopath J. Paul Getty is magnificent. Michelle Williams' understated performance as suffering but steely mother is also good. The cinematic organization is traditional.

Detroit

Kathryn Bigelow got her groove back since her sycophantic "Zero Dark Thirty." The movie is well made and instilled with documentary and mock documentary parts. "The Game of Thrones", as always, appears as a star-making factory (Peter Dinklage, Lena Headey, Sophie Turner and now, Hannah Murray).