Carmela Corleone + Pears Vs Diamonds (1917 Vs 1958)

What are your favourite pieces of classical music?

 I don’t have the slightest musical education so my apologies for the possible abuse of the term “classical” but lately I’ve grown a special affection for the following pieces:

Bach-Capriccio on the departure of a beloved brother- (the way it starts as a grave farewell and then becomes light reminds me of Catullus 65) Cello Suite No.1 and Concertos for Oboe

Corelli- La Follia (or Vivaldi’s version, if I’m feeling extra extra)

Monteverdi- Zefiro Torna, Lamento della Ninfa and many of his madrigals

Jean Baptiste Lully- Armide

Franz Schubert- Serenade, Fantasy in F Minor

Frédéric Chopin- Nocturne, Funeral March, La Polonaise (reminds me of dziady!)

 Felix Mendelssohn- Midsummer Night’s Dream

 Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky- Rococo Variation, Pas de deux from the Nutcracker

I’m in love with the Impressionists: Ravel’s Le Tombeau de Couperin was the first work to make me interested in classical music, and I also love Jeux d’eau, Daphnis et Chloe, Introduction and Allegro, String Quartet- Assez Vif

Claude Debussy: Suite Bergamasque

Erik Satie:  Gymnopédies and Gnossiennes (for cloudy Sunday mornings)

James: “Thanks for coming, Miles”

Miles: “Twat”

Russian fairy tales :

Tale of the Dead Tsarevna and the Seven Bogatyrs (1951)

The Scarlet Flower (1952)

The Snow Maiden (1952)

Sister Alenushka and Brother Ivanushka (1953)

The Magic Bird (1953)

The Twelve Months (1956)

The Snow Queen (1957)

Vasilisa the Beautiful (1977)

Mathilde Kschessinska (31 Aug 1872 – 6 Deb 1971)

Mistress of: Tsar Nicholas II of Russia, among others. Tenure: 1890 - 1894. Royal Bastards: None (Disputed). Fall From Power: The tsar got married.

Mathilda-Marie Feliksovna Kschessinskaya, later Princess Romanovskaya-Krasinskaya, was a ballerina of Polish origins and the mistress of the future Tsar Nicholas II of Russia. She was born into a family of performers and made her debut in a pas de deux during a graduation performance in the spring of 1890, attended by the imperial family, including Emperor Alexander III and his heir Nicholas. She was a “small, vivacious” girl of seventeen with a “supple body, full bosom … dark curls and merry eyes” who immediately piqued the interest of the tsarevich, which Mathilde noticed. After that chance encounter, Mathilde made sure to put herself in Nicholas’ line of sight as frequently as possible, strolling past the Anitchkov Palace where Nicholas and his sister Xenia often stood at the balcony watching passers-by. By summer, she was conveniently selected to join a group that danced for offers at Krasnoe Selo, where Nicholas was on duty with the Guards. He came to watch her every day but it did not go beyond flirtations until late October, when they were finally able to be alone.

Both Nicholas and Mathilde kept detailed diaries, which record their growing affection for one another; Nicholas admitted that he “liked her very much” and that he was “under her spell” while Mathilde wrote that “he had such beautiful eyes, I’m just going crazy.” Nicholas began to give her gifts of bouquets of flowers and jewelry, including a gold bracelet with diamonds and a large sapphire, at her rehearsals. Mathilde made sure to wear stunning dresses when she expected a visit, in the hopes that he would remark upon their beauty (he usually did). The relationship continued until Nicholas’ betrothal to Princess Alix of Hesse-Darmstadt; he made no secret in his interest in the princess and the hope that they would one day marry, much to the distress of Mathilde. She lamented in her diary that no one will love Nicholas as much as she did, and that he will probably forget her when he is married. Her jealously also emerges in her writings, envious of his bride-to-be. The pair said their final goodbyes in 1894 at a highway rendezvous, “she seated in a carriage, he astride a horse.” For months after, Mathilde went through “terrible boundless suffering” of losing Nicholas before being intimately consoled by the Grand Duke Sergei Mikhailovich. He bought her a cottage that overlooked the sea but she was not in love with Sergei, though she did enjoy his company, and pursued his cousin, Andrei Vladimirovich, as well. Their affair began in mid-1900 and she enjoyed a relationship with both men for the better part of two decades – Sergei and Andrei were cordial in public, but tried to avoid each other whenever possible. Matters were complicated further when Mathilde gave birth to a son, Vladimir, in 1902, and no one was quite sure who the father was.

Mathilde continued to use her connection to the tsar and the imperial family to amass valuable property and further her career on stage. Mathilde was extraordinarily gifted as a dancer and obtained the rank of Prima ballerina in 1896 and commanded top billing in theater programs and posters. After the Russian Revolution, Mathilde ended up in exile in Paris. She later married, in 1921, her former flame Andrei, who was devoted to both Mathilde and her child, despite the question of his paternity. The couple enjoyed gambling, though Mathilde squandered their reaming wealth – including her valuable jewelry collection – at the gambling tables of Monte Carlo. Mathilde opened up her own ballet school as a means to earn some much needed income. The school flourished, providing for a comfortable, yet modest lifestyle. Mathilde last performed at the age of 64, for a charity event at Covent Garden in London. She died in Paris, eight months shy of her 100th birthday, and was buried in the Sainte-Genevieve-des-Bois Russian Cemetery, which she shares with her husband and son.

Rumors have persisted that Nicholas continued to meet Mathilde in secret after his marriage, though most historians agree that this is completely untrue. Some accounts do seem dispute this; however, and there are further claims that Mathilde even had a child with the Tsar in 1911, who was later adopted by her bother.

Sources

”Mathilde Kschessinska as Princess Aspicia from the ballet The Pharaoh’s Daughter”, photographic postcard from the book “The Great Russian Dancers” by Gennady Smakov, c. 1898 (left image).

”Mathilde Kschessinska in costume for a Spanish dance” by unknown, 1900 (right image).

Massie, Robert. Nicholas and Alexandra: The Fall of the Romanov Dynasty. Random House Trade Paperbacks (2000). ISBN: 9780345438317.

Hall, Coryne. Imperial Dancer: Mathilde Kschessinska and the Romanovs, Sutton Publishing (2005). ISBN: 9780750935579.

What would you recommend to someone who is just starting to watch horror movies?

Oh hell, yeah!! I love giving recs and I LOVE when people start getting interested in horror. I’ll give you recs in a few different categories so that you don’t watch anything you wouldn’t enjoy:

Early Horror Movies (Most Are Black and White, 1900′s-1950′s):

Nosferatu (1922) (silent film)

Cat People (1942)

Freaks (1932)

White Zombie (1932)

The Man who Laughs (1928)

M (1931)

Rear Window (1954)

The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (1920) (silent film)

Metropolis (1927) (silent film)

Frankenstein (1931)

The Wolf Man (1941)

Dracula (1931)

Bride of Frankenstein (1935)

Dead of Night (1945)

The Incredible Shrinking Man (1957)

Strangers on a Train (1951)

Personal Favorites From the 1960′s (Suspenseful):

Eyes Without a Face (1960)

Rosemary’s Baby (1968)

Night of the Living Dead (1968)

Psycho (1960)

The Birds (1963)

Must-Sees of the 70′s (The Beginning of the Golden Era):

Carrie (1976)

The Exorcist (1973)

Suspiria (1977)

Jaws (1975)

The Omen (1976)

The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974)

Alien (1979)

Halloween (1978)

1980′s Cult Classics (The decade of good special-effects make up):

Re-Animator (1985)

The Shining (1980)

A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984)

An American Werewolf in London (1981)

The Evil Dead (1981)

The Thing (1982)

Hellraiser (1987)

Children of the Corn (1984)

Friday the 13th (1980)

The Lost Boys (1987)

Silver Bullet (1985)

Poltergeist (1982)

Horror-Comedies:

What We do in the Shadows (2014)

Shaun of the Dead (2004)

Deathgasm (2015)

Tucker and Dale vs. Evil (2010)

Zombieland (2009)

The Trouble With Harry (1955)

The Killer Condom (1996)

Dead Alive (1992)

Young Frankenstein (1974)

Little Shop of Horrors (1986)

The Rocky Horror Picture Show (1975)

Idle Hands (1999)

Dead Snow (2009)

Eight-Legged Freaks (2002)

American Psycho (2000)

The Faculty (1998)

Drag Me to Hell (2009)

Slither (2006)

Best of 2000′s-now:

The Loved Ones (2009)

Battle Royale (2000)

Trick R Treat (2007)

American Mary (2012)

The Babadook (2014)

Let the Right One in (2008)

Ginger Snaps (2000)

Martyrs (2008) (very gory, New French Extremity film)

The Hole (2001)

The Eyes of My Mother (2016)

Funny Games (2007)

The Descent (2005)

Excision (2012)

A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night (2014)

Inside (2007) (very gory, New French Extremity film)

High Tension (2003) (very gory, New French Extremity film)

Other Favorites (AKA 90′s horror):

La Ceremonie (1995)

Scream (1996)

Nightbreed (1990)

Jacob’s Ladder (1990)

The Sixth Sense (1999)

The Blair Witch Project (1999)

Audition (1999)

The try of a collection of I would not call “dark” musicals because some of them are quite great fun, let´s call them “Goth-friendly” ^^ Included are film versions also with great music, and with some of them I am not familiar by now but have them on my list.

List of french films

Here are just a few french films you can watch to improve your language skills:-)

Films : - 120 battements par minutes (2017) - Grave (2016) - Trois souvenirs de ma jeunesse (2015) - Comment c’est loin (2015) - La tête haute (2015) - L’étudiante et monsieur Henri (2015) - Réparer les vivants (2015) - Respire (2014) - Yves Saint Laurent (2014) - La vie d’Adèle (2013) - Jeune et jolie (2013) - De rouille et d’os (2012) - Intouchables (2011) - L’amour dure trois ans (2011) - Polisse (2011) - Gainsbourg, vie héroïque (2010) - Le premier jour du reste de ta vie (2008) - Je vais bien, ne t’en fais pas (2006) - Jeux d’enfants (2003) - Le fabuleux destin d’Amélie Poulain (2001) - La haine (1995) - 37.2 le matin / Betty blue (1986)

Animated movies :  - Ma vie de courgette (2016) - Persepolis (2007) - Princes et princesses (1999) - Kirikou et la sorcière (1998)

if you have any question, feel free to ask me : http://mi2kle.tumblr.com/ask

The Merchant of Venice (2004) | Belmont

21.3.1930-30.3.2016 Animator Butyrin

I´m impressed. That contrast between the beautiful art and hideous topic is gorgeous *-*

*Permission from the artist*

artist and colorful version -> https://www.pixiv.net/member.php?id=3311012