Context

There is a breaking of the fourth wall element in theater/cinema. I recall the name only after I start to see significance of such tools. For example, in Killer’s of the Flower Moon, there are at least two sneaky breakings of the fourth wall and one obvious one at the end. I’d say, even if sneaky, they signify key moments to consider.

For whatever questionable reason, I watched Perfect Days by Wim Wenders too recently. Somehow, the director, even if the he has great work, tends to be mentioned by Russian speaking people who signal sophistication. And I’m fine if somebody references, at least after watching it, if the reference is good. But in that case, the referencer probably asked chat-gpt and got hallucinated and confused mix of stuff. So it was the worst possible reference, and I don’t know what to think about that. (BTW: I use chat-gpt to put commas around; hopefully, that does not make my references bad).

Anyway, Perfect Days also has one sneaky and one less so instance of breaking the fourth wall. So, Wenders finally pushed me to get a book on mimics and facial expression. And Chat-GPT gave good advice on the choice of the book.

Book

Another context is that I planned to consider comedy this year, so one title is Blackadder. Rowan Atkinson’s image makes this impression that he is the one who makes the strangest facial expressions. He would be humbled if he saw what expressions Paul Ekman, the author of the book, has produced. He made a lot of direct photos of facial expressions and cut them apart in a recomposable way. Those recomposed ones are the strangest and the most humorous, too, if you ask me.

Talking about quality in general. I’ve enjoyed the no-BS descriptive language of the author. The approach to the subject matter is also very logical and makes sense. I’d need some deliberate practice to be able to make some concluding remarks on it.