Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Entertainment/2014 January 10

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January 10

Notability

I have written an article regarding a male model/actor. His bio is listed both on IMDB and a Spanish publication. I submitted the article with the Spanish publication as the primary bio source. I also cited several other publications as references. The article was denied for the person being non-notable. Would i have been better off using the IMDB reference as the primary source?? Any help would be appreciated... Believe 512Believe512 (talk) 01:35, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

No. IMDb is useless for establishing notability. Every Tomas, Ricardo and Enrique(?) is listed there. Face it. He probably doesn't satisfy WP:NACTOR.Clarityfiend (talk) 03:34, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

A non-notable Enrique. InedibleHulk (talk) 08:53, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

What films depict selectively erasing painful memories?

While one is Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, what other films have similar plots? As long as the film (or TV episode) is about selecting specific hurtful memories to erase, that's what I'm looking for. Thanks. --Let Us Update Wikipedia: Dusty Articles 02:26, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

It seems to happen in Doctor Who a lot, but that's (mostly) a TV series, not a film. HiLo48 (talk) 02:33, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

Eternal Sunshine... is a pretty unique movie in that regard; I did a bit of a search at TV tropes (see [1], and I can't find the specific trope of "Choosing to have specific hurtful memories erased" as a common trope with anything else. There are films which do have more broadly common tropes with Eternal Sunshine... in the sense of the way they play with notions of perception, identity, and memory. Unreliable narrator explores situations where amnesia or other perception issues affect the "reality" being shown to the audience through the eyes of the main character; films as diverse as Fight Club, Jacob's Ladder, Memento, and just about every film directed by Terry Gilliam deal with unreliable narrators whose memory is faulty in some way. Total Recall and Blade Runner both deal with implanted memories (rather than erased memories). As I'm running through ideas, the closest I can think of is characters that experience Repressed memory because of a traumatic experience. The most famous example I can think of is the famous final episode of M*A*S*H titled "Goodbye, Farewell and Amen" where a main character represses a particularly hurtful memory and "replaces" it with a more innocuous one. --Jayron32 03:35, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

Category:Films about altered memories is mighty slim pickin's. Clarityfiend (talk) 04:30, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

I'm trying to recall the name of an underwater movie with an alien spaceship in the shape of a sphere. Half the movie seems to be about the spaceship making people imagine things, and they end up not remembering. Of course, I may not be remembering this well at all. Maybe it's about Alzheimers! HiLo48 (talk) 05:30, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

Sphere? Hack (talk) 05:55, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

Yeah. That's it! I even said the thing was shaped like a sphere. Definitely dementia at least. And yes, they chose to forget at the end. HiLo48 (talk) 06:32, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

In Donnie Darko, there's a bit about proposed "Infant Memory Generators". Gretchen's related question to Donnie, "What if you could go back in time and take all those hours of pain and darkness and replace them with something better?" replays during the climax. Combined with the hypnotherapy sessions, Manipulated Dead remembering the "future" and the Living vaguely recalling their "dream" at the end, it might be relevant. InedibleHulk (talk) 08:50, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

It's not a film, but Dickens's The Haunted Man and the Ghost's Bargain deals precisely with the consequences of the protagonist's decision to allow all his memories of the "sorrow, wrong, and trouble" he has experienced to be expunged. Deor (talk) 11:31, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

Wonder if A Clockwork Orange counts - the brainwashing scene? --TammyMoet (talk) 12:14, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

Seems to be a reasonably common meme in SF/Fantasy TV series:

One of the Star Trek series had a episode where the crew had their memories of an encounter with an alien species removed. They then found out about it and were none too pleased. The aliens promptly did it again when they went back to the planet to complain. Another episode had an alien species altering the timeline to wipe their enemies (and everyone elses memory of them) out of existance.

Vampires often tinker with their victim's memories of their blood soaked encounter.

Astronaut (talk) 16:35, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

There are heaps of older (mostly B/W) movies with a theme of hypnosis being used to help someone either remember repressed stuff, or repress traumatic stuff. Check what IMdB has about hypnosis. -- Jack of Oz ^{[pleasantries]} 18:55, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

It's not a feature film, but removing unpleasant memories was a plot point to the Futurama episode, Fun on a Bun. Matt Deres (talk) 01:25, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

Also not a feature film but an interesting take on the same kind of idea, there's a video game I recently played called Remember Me which heavily features removal and implanting of memories. Organics^LRO 13:01, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

Help me find a book

I'm trying to recommend a book I read in 1975 or 6. It was by an author known for writing on paranormal subjects. Part of it was set in Bali, and explored the religion and practises of the Balinese. A story thread throughout it was of the clash between a girl and a holy man, which ended with one of them removing their own eye and giving it to the other (though I can't remember which way round it was). The author may have been a Brian somebody? Can anyone help?--TammyMoet (talk) 18:45, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

Could it have been Love and Death in Bali, a.k.a. A Tale from Bali, by Vicki Baum? --Amble (talk) 22:04, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

Don't think so, the author had a male name. Thanks.--TammyMoet (talk) 11:42, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

Got it - it was Gifts of Unknown Things by Lyall Watson. --TammyMoet (talk) 20:57, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

60s music doc?

There's a music documentary I've heard of from 1968 or '69. It featured archive footage of several famous acts of the period. The film is now thought lost. What was its title? Theskinnytypist (talk) 20:06, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

I don't see anything in our list of lost films. If it was only a TV documentary, then many of those would have been lost by now, and more information would be needed in order to identify it.--Shantavira|^{feed me} 09:36, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

Do you remember the country of origin? --— Rhododendrites ^talk |  23:07, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

... or any of the acts shown? Ghmyrtle (talk) 10:26, 14 January 2014 (UTC)

Francesca Annis's best TV appearances

I am a fan of Francesca Annis' film work. But her TV appearances mostly seem to be British. Can anyone suggest how to find her best TV shows from a critical/popular viewpoint, so I can figure out what to focus on? Thanks. μηδείς (talk) 23:16, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

Well high on the list would be Lillie (TV series) where she plays Lillie Langtry. She had actually performed the role in a couple episodes of Edward the Seventh but the character is more fully formed in the latter series. Also from the 70's is her performance as Emma Bovary in a BBC adaptation that is available on DVD. For lighter viewing there is Agatha Christie's Partners in Crime. Moving into the 90s Reckless (TV serial) is a treat and Wives and Daughters (1999 miniseries) where she plays a more callow character then usual. In the aughts there is Cranford (TV series) and its sequel Return to Cranford. Her performance as Lady Macbeth in Polanski's Macbeth (1971 film) should probably be on your list as well if you haven't seen it already. You have probably guessed that I am a big fan and have tried to see anything that she has been in so I will add the caveat that you may not like any of these suggestions so my apologies ahead of time if that happens. Others will recommend other performances so you have some fun viewing in front of you. MarnetteD | Talk 23:48, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

Excellent. Yes, it was because I was watching that version of Macbeth (my favorite) that the question came up. I'll have to see which of those series I can find on line. μηδείς (talk) 03:54, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

You might try this site or Amazon. MarnetteD | Talk 04:04, 12 January 2014 (UTC)