Rough Draft: The Dirk Diggler Story (1988)

This amateurish production was the first work of Boogie Nights and Magnolia's director P.T. Anderson. Boogie Nights discovered his undeniable skill for cross-over, interweaving dramatic narrative, while Anderson's attachment to each of his ever lonely and singularly moving characters was perfected and even dared to take a more in-depth look into their existentially-challenged lives within the equally epic frame of the lyrical Magnolia.

Kind of a homage to the all too brief "golden age" of '70s porn cinema, the large scaled and somewhat overblown melodrama that Boogie Nights effortlessly made the audiences care for was first rehearsed in the half hour-long Dirk Diggler Story. Exclusive focus on the main character, his rise and fall, is a major difference between the two versions; we are supposed to catch a glimpse of the real human being behind the big star mostly through interviews with the recently deceased Dirk's close friends and collaborators, who are basically the same people in the 1997 film, and flashback images. Anderson's inventively makes it up for the lack of any actual production values, taking advantage on the obvious limitations in the making of the short feature to give it the appearance of a false documentary or rather a home-made movie, both of which types are some of the most recognisable traits in the video-based adult industry style. 

Also, Anderson's sense of humour, his wit and his powers of persuasion as a storyteller are already here in a way; still not enough in order to relating this title to the misfits odyssey of Boogie Nights without embarrassing afterthoughts. Its significance lies in the context that has its writer and director as one of the most promising figures of American cinema since 1996.

Lee Strasberg

He and protégé Al Pacino appeared together in two films: The Godfather: Part II (1974) and ...And Justice for All (1979)

Famed acting teacher Lee Strassberg was born in Budzanov, Austria-Hungary (now Budanov, Ukraine). Brought to America as a child, he had a brief acting career, before becoming one of the founders of the Group Theatre in 1931, directing a number of plays there. His greatest influence, however, was through the Actors Studio, where he became director in 1950. A proponent of Method acting, which he adapted from the System brought to America by Konstantin Stanislavski's disciple --and Marlon Brando's mentor-- Stella Adler, he influenced several generations of actors, from Jimmy Dean to Dustin Hoffman. Film audiences would know him best as gangster Hyman Roth in The Godfather: Part II.

Some musings regarding Atonement (2007)

Atonement reminds me of that masterpiece of a movie called Blow Up, directed by Michelangelo Antonioni. As in Blow Up, in Atonement we have this dynamic between reality and fiction, which is the most haunting thing about them. In Blow Up (based on one of the best short stories you would read, Julio Cortazar's "Las babas del Diablo"), a fashion photographer happens to discover a crime while taking pictures in a park --or that's what he thinks up until the amazingly ironic, metafiction-related end.

Fiction exists to complete reality, to make justice and give us --the readers, the viewers-- freedom (and not only for the duration of the movie). Appearances have a reality of their own whenever you think of how different they can get from every different person that approaches the same object/subject. It's like all those female teens who read Twilight, and then, out of the many smart ones who didn't dig the screen adaptation at all, they are still so different from each other because at the end it's not about the outside reality --not even of a novel or a flick--, but about who they are as individuals. And that affects everything we touch with our minds. The subjectivity in regards to fiction and the "real" world is the central theme to Atonement, and it is just fascinating to reckon.