THE ODDS: There remains some question as to whether Miguel de Cervantes and William Shakespeare actually died on the same day, but apparently it was close enough for literary work. But what was the likelihood that two other elder masters, Ingmar Bergman and Michaelangelo Antonioni, of another art form (guess which one) would also die on the same day? Too terrible a reminder of a vanished era (1955-1975?) when movies were taken seriously as social commentary.

Sorry, but Grindhouse and Knocked Up just don't count. Not Little Miss Sunshine, either.

For now, a link to Jeffrey Wells' appreciation of Antonioni and especially L'Eclisse, one of the better love letters I've seen today. I had much the same reaction when I watched that film and L'Avventura last summer (neither for the first time): how genuinely ageless these movies are, how stunning to think that both were made nearly fifty years ago. The nerve it took to create movies like that then! And where is that nerve now?