Author: Philippe Mora

  • Meeting the man and movies that put us on the moon

    Meeting the man and movies that put us on the moon

    Thoughts from a cinematic memoir written on Earth by Philippe Mora. In Los Angeles in 1979 I was making a film about the Sixties called The Times They Are A-Changin’ for Columbia and Casablanca, greenlit by Daniel Melnick, producer of All That Jazz. Because of some controversial content my film was eventually stopped before release…

  • Notes from a cinema memoir: Nazi modernism and other conundrums

    Notes from a cinema memoir: Nazi modernism and other conundrums

    “My firm commissioned Ernst Jager to write a brochure on the work involved in Triumph of the Will. Jager wrote a ludicrously overblown text…and unfortunately, because of all my work, I didn’t read his brochure before its publication. Jager had put it together with UFA’s publicity department, which brought it out under my name.” Leni…

  • Notes on Stanley Kubrick: Filmmaker, Artist, Voyeur

    Notes on Stanley Kubrick: Filmmaker, Artist, Voyeur

    These notes were generated after seeing the catalogue of a major exhibition currently on at the Museum of New York City called Through a Different Lens: Stanley Kubrick Photographs. It shows the young Kubrick’s expert eye in about 300 photographs, most from his precocious days as a Look photographer when he joined the staff at…

  • Einstein’s Film at Warner Brothers: Feb 3, 1931

    Einstein’s Film at Warner Brothers: Feb 3, 1931

    It’s very hard to explain one’s enthusiasm about a film or particular piece of film because one is steered by the sum of one’s life experience at that point, and everyone’s experience is different. I will try and explain why the below clip is one of my favourite films of all time. It crosses all…