Ray Carney’s
Mailbag Highlights |
 Film |
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| Enough with the praise for the young and the noble. Click here to read what's WRONG with American independent film. |
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| The film Gena Rowlands doesn't want you to see. The film she wants to destroy. Video clips from the first version of John Cassavetes' Shadows. |
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| To listen to a radio commercial for Cassavetes' Faces and the soundtrack of a scene cut from Husbands |
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Why Donald Trump does not understand art. Why are we addicted to struggle, competition, rivalry, achievement, and reward as ways of creating drama in film? Aren't the most important parts of life about other things? Can't we make films that are not secretly (or not so secretly) apologies for the worst aspects of American capitalism? |
78 |
What? Art is not just entertainment? Independent film recommendations |
67 |
Is Mabel John Cassavetes in drag? You decide. A self-portrait of John Cassavetes |
77 |
“…In the NUDE, all that is not beautiful is obscene…” Quotes by filmmakers |
58 |
Your Life Is a Movie. Some indie film recommendations and a book on what’s wrong with contemporary film |
36 |
Shhh! It’s a secret, don’t tell anyone! What Ray Carney loves about mainstream films Ray Carney’s favorite mainstream films, actors and actresses |
22, 105 |
Kitschy, kitschy, koo! Taking on Hitchcock and Spielberg
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56 |
Wallowing in the Slime Pit. Why are American films and reviewing so bad?
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| The Boring Ultimatum |
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Do you have what it takes to be a Survivor? Ask Arthur Vibert Film, advertising and the end of art |
88 |
| What the heck is "independent cinema?" Sorting the sheep from the goats |
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Harvard Film Archive Screening Notes |
2006, 2007, 9@Night,Wings of Desire |
 Education |
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| Tell the truth but tell it slant: Parables for students and teachers |
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| Interviewing for Philistines 101: Pay attention journalists! |
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Do you want cheese or fries with that? All Entertainment All the Time Essay by Mark Edmundson |
74 |
Learning for “Dummies” Three kinds of learning, do you know them? |
12 |
| Immoral art, immoral criticism and immoral education: A discussion of Jonathan Glover's book, Humanity: A Moral History of the Twentieth Century |
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| Corporate-speak: You can't handle the truth! |
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Why is Helen Keller screaming? The Poirier method of reading and discovering language |
91 |
Group Thinking as the Source of Fascism in an American University
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Brain-dead or brain-washed? A reflection on celebrity culture and the apathy of many college film students |
95,96 |
I cannot praise a fugitive and cloistered virtue. Censorship and the fear of free-expression at an American university |
98,101,111, 115, 121, 122 |
The manipulation of student opinion and the origins of fascism |
102,111 |
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 The “Other Arts” |
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Did Mozart know how to “go with the flow?” Music and literature recommendations |
57 |
It’s all Greek to me! The basics of art speech |
46 |
Rant alert! What is the function of art? Resistance against the system |
73 |
Would you hang out with these guys? Ray Carney’s visit with artists’ masterworks in a museum |
64 |
Was Bach an alien from another planet? Thoughts on Bach’s Well-Tempered Clavier |
72 |
What’s it all about, Alfie? On being an artist and living creatively |
49 |
Art-as-resistance, art-as-defiance, art-as-challenge Department Brief excerpt from James Joyce's glorious, mysterious, sacred description of the glory, the mystery, and the holiness of the earth, the heavens, and the love of a woman from the "Ithaca" chapter of Ulysses |
71 |
A Mozart and a Bach a day keeps the doctor away Source for complete Bach and Mozart CD collections |
55 |
Everything you wanted to know about music but were afraid to ask. Music Appreciation 101 – how to enjoy the things you’re “supposed to” like classical music |
53 |
What is a hot and sweaty jealous mistress? Quotes on Art |
48 |
And you thought you knew how to listen to a CD… Listening to music 101 with recommendations |
44 |
| True confessions of an art addict |
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| ART. It's not for sissies or couch potatoes! |
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| Do critics make the best lovers? Find out in "Last Will and Testament of an Ex-Literary Critic," an essay by Frank Lentricchia |
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What is Shakespeare’s trampoline? Art is in the complexities of language, images, steps. Horror of horrors, it’s not in the PLOT! |
24 |
 Ask Yoda |
Page |
Why spin your electrons? May the Force be with you The existence of souls and how we make them |
43 |
Are you a “football to the universe?” How not to waste your life and how to tend your soul |
78 |
You may have had a lot to drink last night, but are you conscious yet? Stages of consciousness – resistance, separation, emotional and wholeheartedness |
48 |
Would Jesus make the cover of Time? Great teachers and the importance of finding one |
8 |
The aliens’ dessert menu “What does it mean to be human?” masterworks |
88 |
 Planetary Influences |
Page |
Find out why Ray Carney thinks Global Warming has it backward. Better wear your overcoat… |
55 |
Can we do it without the drugs? Cultural Transformation |
24 |
Do you have what it takes? The power of imagination Going beyond politics to free our hearts, minds and souls. We must think bigger! |
45 |
Fighting the greatest evil of our time. Distraction. Some non-fiction recommendations. |
23 |
Blood and guts in the trenches Discussion on Americans and their institutes: Breaking free of systems |
71 |
Ray Carney's annual Christmas message. Timeless and timely. Or too late? Decades too late? |
51 |
“…I would write on the lintels of the door-post, Whim…” Quotes on Genius |
49 |
| Do you have what it takes? Boot-camp recruiting for humanity. Intentionality and being a minimal moral agent |
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| Blacked-out by the know-nothing media. The most important event in the history of civilization. |
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The passions and obsessions of Ray Carney, raw and uncensored. Secret: They’re all in his syllabus… |
10 |
 Mailbag Categories & Departments |
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"God Bless My Dutiful Readers" Department |
88 |
"I spake as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child" Department |
91 |
"The Life of a Scholar" Department |
86 |
"Mark (Burnett) of the Devil" Category |
80 |
"Much have I traveled in the realms of gold” Category |
37, 65, 73 |
“Novelty” Department |
54, 57 |
"Now a Word From Michael Moore" Department |
72 |
"One more lost film," "ho hum," "whassup" category |
64 |
"Please give it a rest" Category |
44 |
"Under the radar" Category |
65, 69, 80 |
"What's wrong with film competitions" Category |
58 |
| The struggle for free expression. Clichés wait everywhere to entrap you. Break free of the system. Speak your soul. Give all to love. When half-loves go, the Gods arrive. |
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| Why are we in so love with images? Why do we look to them to save our souls? All evidence and experience points the other way. Leave vision and return to the word, the Logos, the idea, the world. |
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"What's wrong with this picture?" Department |
91 |
