Solaris (1972, dir. Andrei Tarkovsky), full movie in HD
Andrei Rublev (1966, dir. Andrei Tarkovsky), full film in HD
one of the greatest films of the 20th century
Regina Spektor - Pound of Flesh
Live at Bull Moose (2005)
context for this brilliant song:
In Shakespeare’s play The Merchant of Venice, Shylock is a Jew and moneylender in Venice who agrees to lend a sum of money to his enemy the merchant Antonio, a Christian and antisemite who has spat at, insulted, and humiliated him on dozens of occasions in the past - with the caveat of demanding a pound of his flesh as security on the loan. After his merchant ships are reported lost in a storm, the now-bankrupt Antonio defaults on the loan, and Shylock, adamant on claiming his revenge, pursues obtaining his pound of flesh in a legal court. The heroine of the play, Portia, points out that Antonio agreed to give up a pound of his flesh, but not his blood, and Shylock cannot gain his pound of flesh without drawing blood, something his contract does not allow for. Thus Shylock’s revenge is thwarted, and for his “villainy” he is punished with giving up his wealth and his forced conversion to Christianity. Although his motives stem from the very human feelings of humiliation and vengeance, his dogged pursuit of revenge has been held up as supporting racist views of Jews as greedy and vicious. The “pound of flesh” has become a famous phrase in culture as meaning any unnecessarily painful punishment or condition in a contract.
Ezra Pound was a Christian early-20th century poet who was a major figure in early modernist poetry. He was also violently antisemitic, and a fascist collaborator in Italy during WWII. During the war and the Holocaust in Italy, he made hundreds of paid radio broadcasts for the Italian government attacking the United States, Franklin D. Roosevelt, Great Britain, international finance, munitions makers and mongers, and Jews, among others, as causes, abettors and prolongers of the world war, as a result of which he was arrested in 1945 by American forces in Italy on charges of treason. Deemed unfit to stand trial, he was incarcerated in St. Elizabeths psychiatric hospital in Washington, D.C., for over 12 years. After a campaign by fellow writers, he was released in 1958, and lived in Italy until his death in 1972. His work remains controversial for his political and economic views.
In the song, a purgatorial, phantasmal Ezra Pound appears to the unnamed singer as a skeleton sitting on their bed, asking the singer to spare a pound of their flesh to cover his bared bones. This imagery, of an antisemite using the words of a (fictional) Jew, turns the famous phrase on its head and transforms its meaning into a powerful indictment of antisemitism through the concept of post-mortem spiritual torment and poetic justice.
Regina Spektor is a Jew of Russian heritage, and has tackled antisemitism in several of her songs, including “Pound of Flesh” and “Ink Stains”.
Regina Spektor - Wallet
Far (2009)
Superman Returns - flight scene