28 Film Discussion Threads Later

[Skitch]

I've said it before and I'll say it again: A Bittersweet Life is damn near a perfect film.

[megladon8]

Saw Cronenberg's The Fly for the first time last night. Will shoot right up into my top 10 first viewings of the year.

The real life chemistry between Goldblum and Davis not only sells the film's emotional gut punch, but also makes the body horror all the more terrifying and saddening.

Probably Cronenberg's most "human" film after Dead Ringers.

Brilliant stuff, and much more identifiably Cronenberg than I had expected. Plenty of venereal body horror.

[Skitch]

Saw Cronenberg's The Fly for the first time last night.

W H A T ? ? ?

I have failed you, my friend.

FANTASTIC movie.

[DFA1979]

Yeah The Fly is great. I still need to see the original flick.

[StuSmallz]

It has so many wonderful moments that have nothing to do with a shark. The table scene where father and son make faces...It's interesting you say that, since, while I thought Jaws was a very good movie in general, it's never quite been a favorite of mine, because I actually found the scenes not having to do with "Bruce" and the hunt for him to be less engaging than the ones that did. I mean, they were still good, just not as good as the shark-related material, you know?

[StuSmallz]

Daniel Craig gave James Bond a soul, even when the films lacked it (https://www.avclub.com/daniel-craig-gave-james-bond-a-soul-even-when-the-film-1847824504)

[StanleyK]

Rewatched Raising Arizona for the umpteenth time, one of the funniest movies ever in my opinion, and I guess it's true that comedy is about expectations because I think I didn't laugh once. Don't get me wrong, it's one of my favorites and I had a huge smile on my face the whole way through, but I knew every single funny bit in advance and didn't have the sudden release of laughter. Conversely, my eyes were welling up during the ending dream, which wasn't the case before.

[DFA1979]

"Son, you've got a panty on your head."

[Idioteque Stalker]

Gave up trying to find a proper release of Otomo/Rintaro/Kawajiri anthology Neo Tokyo (used dvds on ebay are $200+, no streaming options) and found a random way to watch it online. Awesome animation -- imagine that! Rintaro's short was crazy abstract, Kawajiri's felt the most "complete" and therefore satisfying, and Otomo's was the most entertaining but ended very suddenly. The whole thing was over far too soon (three shorts in 49 mins). Much respect to the project, but far from my favorite anime anthology. In that regard, I think Memories may be unsurpassable.

Memories > The Animatrix > Neo Tokyo > Robot Carnival

Looks like Genius Party is probably my next stop, but that won't be for a while probably. Short Peace is supposed to be solid, and there's something called Twilight Q that looks Twilight Zone-inspired and has involvement from Mamoru Oshii. So that might be worth something. OVAs confuse me.

[megladon8]

Memories tears me up inside.

[StuSmallz]

https://i.ibb.co/FKNrRNG/reviewskyfall-16-9.jpg (https://ibb.co/MsWvFWq)


Everyone needs a hobby.

So... what's yours?

Resurrection.

When it comes to movie series, there are few that are as old, iconic, or as universally beloved as the Bond films, with the outlandish adventures of the secret agent managing to transcend their British origin, in order to consistently thrill audiences all over the world for over half a century now. However, while this lofty pedigree has been a gift to the franchise, it's also been a curse as well, with the baggage of overly campy or lackluster entries (lookin' at you, Quandumb Of Solass...), hopelessly dated sexual politics, and the question of whether the films can dodge cultural irrelevance all serving to continually challenge Bond. However, rather than dodge these serious issues, series newcomer Sam Mendes instead choose to boldly tackle them head-on with 2012's Skyfall, resulting in what is not just one of the best Bonds of the Craig era, but also just one of the best entries of the entire franchise, and a vital, necessary shot in the arm for a supposedly outdated series.


It opens with Bond in Istanbul, as he tries to recover a stolen hard drive, one that contains the identity of every NATO agent currently embedded in a terrorist organization, only to fail and nearly die in the process, a rare example of weakness on the part of the super-spy. However, while licking his wounds in Turkey by indulging in non-stop boozing and womanizing (well, even more than usual), an attack on the heart of MI6 brings the presumed dead Bond back to life and duty, although the question of whether he's still up to the task lingers in the air, as he and M must fight side-by-side against a specter from the latter's past, a vengeful reminder of her "sins" who won't rest until he sees the spymaster dead and buried, just like all the other agents she grimly sent to their deaths beforehand.


Through this story, Skyfall serves as a clear meta-commentary on the overall relevance of Bond, both the character and the franchise as a whole, which is a very fitting touch for the 50th anniversary of the franchise (a detail that's subtly pointed to when Bond drinks some fine, 1962-vintage scotch that's as old as he is), with characters and situations continually questioning whether the fieldwork of the retro, analog-era spy is still of use next to the technology of the modern digital age, only for Bond to reaffirm his utility by repeatedly rising to the occasion. In this way, the film both tributes Bond’s past (particularly with the reappearance of a certain iconic Aston Martin), while also updating him for the contemporary cinematic landscape, proving that the secret agent's adventures are still just as thrilling (if not moreso) as any superhero flying around in the theater next door.


In addition to that, Skyfall excels through its combination of style and substance, with the former coming courtesy of cinematography legend Roger Deakin use of grand, sweeping shots, extremely deep shadows, and moody, monochromatic lighting, crafting an aesthetic experience as sleek as Bond himself, with each scene's striking imagery feeling both grounded in the real world, and "heightened" at the same time, easily bumping the film a notch or two above the typical Bond movie in terms of style.


As for the substance, that's derived from Skyfall's strong, sharply-written characterizations, both with Javier Bardem's "Raoul Silva", a cyberterrorist who radiates a quiet, oddball menace throughout (think Anton Chigurh meets The Joker), and who adds a personal nature to the film's stakes, as well as with the central pairing of Bond & M. Throughout the film, they share an uneasy tension, due to the way that M's "judgement call" in Istanbul caused Bond's initial failure there, with plenty of passive-aggressive remarks and second guessing flying both ways throughout, only for that trepidation to give way to a reaffirmation of their relationship, as M's unwavering faith in Bond is ultimately justified in the end, with our faith in him as an audience being redeemed in the process. In this way, Skyfall reminded us that this series was more relevant than ever before, bringing 007 back with a vengeance, and further securing his already formidable cinematic legacy in the process, so, just in case it slipped your mind, the name's Bond... James Bond; don't you forget it.

Final Score: 8.75
.

[Idioteque Stalker]

I made a list of my favorite modern (1970-) b&w movies. The one on LB is a little longer, but here is the top 20:


1. Stranger Than Paradise
2. Raging Bull
3. The Ascent
4. Manhattan
5. Ed Wood
6. Schindler’s List
7. Down by Law
8. Computer Chess
9. Young Frankenstein
10. The Lighthouse

11. Eraserhead
12. Stardust Memories
13. November
14. Zelig
15. The Elephant Man
16. Killer of Sheep
17. Mutual Appreciation
18. The Last Picture Show
19. Lenny
20. La Haine

[Skitch]

Pi should be top ten! :p

and of course you know I wish that other flick was on there, but to each there own lol

[Idioteque Stalker]

Pi should be top ten! :p

FWIW I didn't forget about Pi. It's #23. I remember being thoroughly entranced and disturbed, but I haven't seen it since probably '05.

Others on the list that could use a rewatch are Computer Chess, Stardust Memories, and The Last Picture Show. And if I'm being honest, Schindler's List.

Movies I look forward to seeing in the near future because I feel they have a decent chance of kicking something off: Paper Moon, Tetsuo the Iron Man, Satantango, The Turin Horse, Ida, Blue Jay.

[Skitch]

*whispers*

cleeeeeeerks

[Idioteque Stalker]

Not a bad suggestion by any means. Not gonna make the list though, at least not without a rewatch. Pretty sure the only time I saw it was in a morning film class.

[Skitch]

Uh...that's like, really cool. Good on your teacher.

[StuSmallz]

5. Ed Wood How about that other B&W Depp movie from the mid-90's, though?

[Idioteque Stalker]

How about that other B&W Depp movie from the mid-90's, though?

Jarmusch owns this list, but Dead Man has never been a favorite. That being said, I did put it at #30.

[megladon8]

I have seen so few of those. Thanks for all the suggestions.

[StuSmallz]

I finally watched the new Dune a couple of days ago (not on HBOMax, but in a theater as God intended), and as far as its (moderate) flaws go, I'd say the biggest one is with the movie's slightly unwieldy overall structure, where the first half spent a ton of time on character introductions, table-setting the central conflicts, and general world-building and exposition with the various cultures and technologies of the "Duniverse", while the second half was essentially an overlong extended climax, with the number of false endings used proving to be even more egregious than those of Return Of The King.


That being said though, I still liked the movie a good deal on the whole, and speaking of Lord Of The Rings, like that series, I think part two of this will be even better, now that part one's done a lot of the hard work of introducing us to this particular universe. For now though, I'll just say that, even as someone who's never read the book (or even watched the reportedly abbreviated Lynch adaptation), this Dune still did a good job of acclimatizing me to the iconic world that Frank Herbert created, as, despite the overall complexity of the story, I was rarely at any serious loss as to what was going on, and besides that, it feels like a movie tailor-made for Villeneuve's strengths as a director, as both an overwhelming sensory experience (an attack by a massive sandworm on a Spice harvester stands out in particular), as well as a bold work of Science-Fiction, full of big, ambitious ideas, the kind that's made the genre a favorite of mine; bring on part two, baby!


Final Score: 8.5

[Skitch]

You guys have to watch the Lynch version. It's a checklist film, and worth a watch to see how cramming the whole book in one film would look. Hell it's worth watching for the practical effects and set designs.

[dreamdead]

I've used the Criterion Channel to dig into some 1970s films that I always glossed over in the past. Night Moves and The Taking of Pelham 123 were just delightfully gritty, willing to underscore larger communities beyond the main character, and really focus on mood via their scores and codas. Especially Taking..., which wrapped up Shaw's main villain--and refused to fully explain him--in a satisfying way led still had to pay off the sneezing baddie. Just a great final moment that was inevitable yet suggested a constantly thinking lead in Matthau.

Also watched Kiyoshi Kurosawa's To the Ends of the Earth, which was both a departure for him and a continuation of how daily horror can become more terrifying than genre templates. The scenes where the lead is running through Uzbekistan trying to flee state police is as scary in its immediacy as things in Kairo or Cure, and that ending song. I was not prepared for it or for Kurosawa would frame it. It was a bravura sequence that risked credibility, yet it took the film to higher heights and left me with such a delightful high. Strong stuff, though I understand the difficulty in promoting it stateside.

[Idioteque Stalker]

I finally watched my first Douglas Sirk movie, All that Heaven Allows, and it lived up to the hype. Thrilled I got it on blu ray because the colors... I mean, what the what!? Incredible. Sirk is giving me a whole new appreciation for Technicolor. The doctor giving relationship advice was one mansplain over the line for this otherwise-quite-subversive story, but it's a small gripe considering just how satisfying at least two other moments were: TV for Christmas (a perfectly set up OOF), and the ending. I knew there was only 90 seconds left and was wondering, "how are they gonna wrap this up?" Then it hit like a ton of bricks and I literally started cheering and applauding, much to the horror of my cats.

My second Sirk will be expedited.

[Yxklyx]

I would definitely watch Written on the Wind next and I loved Magnificent Obsession.

Putney Swope - everyone here should watch this and it's on the Criterion channel.

[Idioteque Stalker]

Yeah, I was looking at Written on the Wind next because of Lauren Bacall.

Funny you bring up Putney Swope because I watched Chafed Elbows today. Iron Man's dad was a filmmaker ahead of his time.

[Yxklyx]

Yeah, I was looking at Written on the Wind next because of Lauren Bacall.

Funny you bring up Putney Swope because I watched Chafed Elbows today. Iron Man's dad was a filmmaker ahead of his time.

Funny you mention Chafed Elbows because that mention on letterboxed prompted me to watch Putney Swope - which is a wow film.

[Peng]

All that Heaven Allows was also my first Sirk some...gulp...seven years back. During the past year I've been slowly getting into more of his films from his final one (Imitation of Life) going backwards, and my top five so far:

1. Imitation of Life
2. The Tarnished Angels
3. There's Always Tomorrow (Barbara Stanwyck is so great in his two films she's in)
4. Written on the Wind
5. All That Heave Allows (need a rewatch though, as I feel I would click more with it now)

[Idioteque Stalker]

I have seen so few of those. Thanks for all the suggestions.

You should look into November. An underseen movie potentially down your alley.

[Idioteque Stalker]

Funny you mention Chafed Elbows because that mention on letterboxed prompted me to watch Putney Swope - which is a wow film.

Nice. I thoroughly enjoyed both Putney Swope and Chafed Elbows. The former is more notable for being ahead of its time, and the latter is more notable for its experimental style. Both are very funny in a proto-Adult Swim type of way. It's cool to discover Robert Downey Sr. was such a fun-loving weirdo.

[Idioteque Stalker]

And Peng, it's nice to hear that there's plenty more to dig into with Sirk. Written on the Wind will probably be next. There's Always Tomorrow wasn't on my radar before you mentioned it, but Stanwyck is a good draw for sure.

Reading about Sirk a little, apparently his movies were often marketed as "movies for women," which is so interesting in hindsight. Textually and extra-textually, the dude's movies seem to be goldmines of gender analysis in film.

[StuSmallz]

https://i.ibb.co/YZKF1NP/https-blogs-images-forbes-com-scottmendelson-files-2016-09-maxresdefault-1.jpg (https://ibb.co/ZmwpFfG)

​Why are they here?

Time; it's one of those inescapable, universal concepts, one that varies so wildly from one person to the next, but at the same time, it's also one of the most rigid, unyielding things in existence. I mean, just think about it; no matter how rich or poor you are, or how powerful or insignificant or whatever other individual traits a person has possessed, no one in the history of the human race has ever had any amount of control over the nature of time, as it's a river that only ever flows in the same forward direction, washing away everyone and thing in its ceaseless tide, and no matter how pivotal or how much emotional power a moment may hold for you, once it's gone, it's gone forever, its fleeting existence swept away by that merciless river. It's an absolutely humbling concept to contemplate, but one that Denis Villeneuve's Arrival challenges by asking "What if that river... didn't flow in one direction?", a question that has earth-shaking repercussions for both its characters and for us as viewers, as the film shatters both our emotions and our perceptions of reality at the same time, with its tale of human fragility that is forever transformed by visitors from far beyond the stars.

It tells the story of Louise Banks, a linguist who is struggling to recover from the recent death of her daughter, until she's snapped out of her daily stupor by the arrival of twelve alien spacecrafts around the world, an event which leads the government to recruit Banks to use her considerable knowledge of language to devise a way to communicate with the reclusive, foreboding extraterrestrials, and find an answer to the question that the rest of the world is hastily racing to answer: "Why are they here?".

However, as Louise gradually learns the intimidatingly complex language of these visitors, her awareness of the world around her slowly begins to transform, a change which not only radically alters Banks on a personal level, but our perception of the film itself, as what we thought we knew about this story is irrevocably changed. In this, the film uses our linear experience of time against us in a brilliant creative decision, one that I'm loathe to go into any further detail about in fears of spoiling Arrival any further, and ruin the aspect that has left the film lingering so vividly in my head since the first time I experienced it, as, like the best Science-Fiction, this is a film bursting at the seams with absolutely endless possibilities, and big, bold, thought-provoking IDEAS, while also always respecting our intelligence, and refusing to over-explain or hold our hands through its uniquely, beautifully fractured plot.

Not that the story machinations are the only thing I love about Arrival, mind you, as another aspect that stands out is the positive twist it places on the familiar, time-worn narrative of aliens invading Earth, as, instead of these "invaders" seeking to mindlessly destroy or conquer humanity like so many other works in this genre, the ones in Arrival instead peacefully visit the planet in order to teach us in various ways, not only how to communicate in their insanely complicated language of ornate circles, but also to get the various, distrusting nations of the world to cooperate in the process, affirming humanity's ability to cross artificial lines such as language and arbitrary national borders, and put aside our petty, meaningless differences for the good of all mankind.

Additionally, I also have to admire the fundamentally down-to-Earth (no pun intended) approach Arrival takes to its central premise, as it refuses to become overly America-centric and lose sight of the big geo-political picture even its mostly single location narrative, as it takes an incredibly plausible look at how the various nations of the Earth would likely react to this scenario. In this way, the film plays out a bit like a thinking man's version of Independence Day (a particularly apt bit of irony, seeing as how Arrival was released the same year as a rather irrelevant sequel to that film), as it contrasts alien invasion films of the past with a more thoughtful take on a “first contact” scenario, a fundamentally optimistic, forward-looking one, which succeeds in making you feel like there's hope for the future of the human race, if we could all just start working together as a species for once.

Finally, Arrival excels as a fundamentally overwhelming experience, in both a sensory sense as well as an emotional one, as it takes a cold, sometimes outright menacing tone, one that perfectly captures the terrifying beauty of making such contact, whether it be the sterile, manmade environments that seem as alien as the ones that were actually built by aliens, Jóhann Jóhannsson's foreboding, avant garde score, or the sight of the massive, oval-shaped craft eclipsing the Montana landscape like the black monolith in a certain other Sci-Fi film, while also managing to balance that coldness with a strong emotional warmth, as the film's slow pacing and initially detached, subdued style eventually gives way, and the characters are forever changed by the world-shattering revelations brought about by their experiences, their inner emotional barriers completely demolished in the process.

And, as Max Richter's beautiful composition "On The Nature Of Daylight" begins to play at the end, Arrival achieves the minor miracle of touching our hearts just as much as it's stimulated our minds, as we catch fleeting glimpses of intimate, defining moments in the characters' lives, past, present, and future all blending together into an absolutely overwhelming, heartbreaking kaleidoscope of imagery and emotion, one that I will never, ever forget as long as I live; they have arrived, indeed.

Favorite Moment:


https://youtu.be/h10sJv3IacQ

Final Score: 9
.

[Dukefrukem]

Oof

[baby doll]

My favourite Douglas Sirk movies, in order of preference, are Imitation of Life, The Tarnished Angels, Written on the Wind, All That Heaven Allows, All I Desire, and The Time to Love and the Time to Die. I need to take another look at There's Always Tomorrow but it bored me the one time I saw it back in 2008.

[StuSmallz]

OofYes...?

[Skitch]

I need to watch Arrival again. I own the blu, but I was downright traumatized by the first watch. As a parent, it was brutal. Still haven't seen a Denis film that disappointed.

[Peng]

My favourite Douglas Sirk movies, in order of preference, are Imitation of Life, The Tarnished Angels, Written on the Wind, All That Heaven Allows, All I Desire, and The Time to Love and the Time to Die. I need to take another look at There's Always Tomorrow but it bored me the one time I saw it back in 2008.

We have a pretty close film match-up for once with this ranking, excepting There's Always Tomorrow and just switching your last two.

[StuSmallz]

I need to watch Arrival again. I own the blu, but I was downright traumatized by the first watch. As a parent, it was brutal. Still haven't seen a Denis film that disappointed.I wasn't fully satisfied by Sicario, but everything else (https://letterboxd.com/stusmallz/tag/villeneuve/reviews/) I've seen from him has been at least very good, and Arrival is at the top of that pile as his best movie to date, if you ask me. I mean, I already thought it was very good the first time I saw it (which held a special significance to me personally, since I saw it with my sister, who was pregnant with her first child at the time, which give an extra relevance to the film's themes), but it only improved upon rewatch since I had a better grasp on the story machinations, with those last five minutes in particular really putting it over the top for me, since I genuinely teared up a bit during them this time:


https://youtu.be/h10sJv3IacQ

<3

[baby doll]

everything else (https://letterboxd.com/stusmallz/tag/villeneuve/reviews/) I've seen from him has been at least very good, and Arrival is at the top of that pile as his best movie to date, if you ask me.My favourites are still Maelström and Un 32 août sur terre (i.e., the early, funny ones), perhaps in part because I saw them first, back in my teenage years. (I haven't seen Maelström in more than fifteen years, but when I re-watched Un 32 août sur terre a few years ago, I found it looked even better than when I first saw it in the early 2000s.) I'd put Polytechnique slightly behind those films (it's very Official Canadian Cinema), although one could probably argue it's a more successful film on its own terms than Villeneuve's more freewheeling early work. I liked Incendies overall despite some improbable plot developments designed to hammer home the film's thesis. I liked the beginning and ending of Arrival but the middle sections mostly drag. Blade Runner 2047 has some cool visuals but I couldn't get interested in the plot. Enemy is thoroughly awful, a pretentious dirge about characters that are impossible to believe in. I haven't seen Prisoners, Sicario, or Dune and I'm in no rush to see any of them. Given that nearly a decade passed between Villenueve's second feature and his third, it's not surprising that he would turn careerist, but I still find myself wondering about the kinds of films he might've made in a more hospitable production climate. Would he have made a masterpiece by now? We'll never know.

[megladon8]

Sorry, what do you mean by "careerist"?

[baby doll]

Sorry, what do you mean by "careerist"?Prioritizing success within the film industry. Villeneuve made his first films towards the tail end of a period of relative openness in Canadian cinema, where it was possible to make films that were pretty weird and uncommercial while still working within the system. Films like Léolo, The Saddest Music in the World, and Cronenberg's Crash represent the upper limit of strangeness that the official institutions were willing to tolerate at this time; on the other hand, Egoyan's Calendar couldn't be made inside the system because it was shot in an active war zone without a script (the funding for that film came from Germany and Armenia, not Telefilm). This period of openness came to an end in the mid-2000s when the Conservative government announced that they weren't going to spend public money on art films nobody was watching and the industry shifted to producing Hollywood-style movies that nobody watches. (Tellingly, John Greyson hasn't made a feature film since 2003.) Polytechnique and especially Incendies are the kinds of films that tend to win local industry awards because they're Serious Movies About Important Subjects (the École Polytechnique massacre and the Lebanese Civil War, respectively), and the latter film's international success paved the way for Villeneuve to make films in Hollywood. In other words, it's what's called in the industry a "calling card film": a film that exists primarily to showcase its director's talent and attract investments for subsequent, bigger-budget projects. From the perspective of his career, Villeneuve made all the right moves: not only was he able to continue working (and for almost a decade following Maelström, it was a real question whether he would ever make another film), but he was able to make it in Hollywood directing big-budget special effects movies. Not surprisingly, his later films are a lot tamer than his early ones, but then under the circumstances, he's probably as adventurous as is possible for a filmmaker in his position to be. The alternative would be to work outside the system, as Guy Maddin mostly does, but to do so would be financially disastrous. When Maddin taught a class at the University of Toronto in 2020 just before the pandemic, he said on the first day that he only took the job because he needed money to pay the rent.

[megladon8]

Very interesting, thank you!

And that is kind of disgusting about Maddin. I can't believe a Canadian staple like him is struggling.

[StuSmallz]

My favourites are still Maelström and Un 32 août sur terre (i.e., the early, funny ones), perhaps in part because I saw them first, back in my teenage years. (I haven't seen Maelström in more than fifteen years, but when I re-watched Un 32 août sur terre a few years ago, I found it looked even better than when I first saw it in the early 2000s.) I'd put Polytechnique slightly behind those films (it's very Official Canadian Cinema), although one could probably argue it's a more successful film on its own terms than Villeneuve's more freewheeling early work. I liked Incendies overall despite some improbable plot developments designed to hammer home the film's thesis. I liked the beginning and ending of Arrival but the middle sections mostly drag. Blade Runner 2047 has some cool visuals but I couldn't get interested in the plot. Enemy is thoroughly awful, a pretentious dirge about characters that are impossible to believe in. I haven't seen Prisoners, Sicario, or Dune and I'm in no rush to see any of them. Given that nearly a decade passed between Villenueve's second feature and his third, it's not surprising that he would turn careerist, but I still find myself wondering about the kinds of films he might've made in a more hospitable production climate. Would he have made a masterpiece by now? We'll never know.As far as his pre-2015 efforts go, I think I should probably prioritize Incendies first; anyway, as for what I have seen from him, Sicario wasn't bad, but it still didn't live up to its full potential, because the particular detachment of Villeneuve's style made it be a not particularly thrilling, well... Thriller (one scene of a particularly intense confrontation was filmed entirely in a medium shot, when it cried out for at least one close-up), so it couldn't help but feel a bit like No Country For Old Men (https://letterboxd.com/stusmallz/film/no-country-for-old-men/) Junior as a result. His style's definitely better suited to big, ambitious Science-Fiction like Arrival, which I found engaging even through the mid-section, since I dug its slowly-unravelling mystery, and explorations of language, and how the nations of the world would likely react in such a scenario. And, as for 2049, I had some problems with its length, pacing, and tone, but still found it extremely impressive on a sensory level, with its overwhelming sights and sounds, and I found the ideas and concepts it explored very compelling as well. Anyway, I don't imagine you'd like Dune if you didn't like it, since it's a slight step down, but it's still pretty good anyway, so, yeah... he's been doing quite well lately, if you ask me.

[StuSmallz]

Prioritizing success within the film industry. Villeneuve made his first films towards the tail end of a period of relative openness in Canadian cinema, where it was possible to make films that were pretty weird and uncommercial while still working within the system. Films like Léolo, The Saddest Music in the World, and Cronenberg's Crash represent the upper limit of strangeness that the official institutions were willing to tolerate at this time; on the other hand, Egoyan's Calendar couldn't be made inside the system because it was shot in an active war zone without a script (the funding for that film came from Germany and Armenia, not Telefilm). This period of openness came to an end in the mid-2000s when the Conservative government announced that they weren't going to spend public money on art films nobody was watching and the industry shifted to producing Hollywood-style movies that nobody watches. (Tellingly, John Greyson hasn't made a feature film since 2003.) Polytechnique and especially Incendies are the kinds of films that tend to win local industry awards because they're Serious Movies About Important Subjects (the École Polytechnique massacre and the Lebanese Civil War, respectively), and the latter film's international success paved the way for Villeneuve to make films in Hollywood. In other words, it's what's called in the industry a "calling card film": a film that exists primarily to showcase its director's talent and attract investments for subsequent, bigger-budget projects. From the perspective of his career, Villeneuve made all the right moves: not only was he able to continue working (and for almost a decade following Maelström, it was a real question whether he would ever make another film), but he was able to make it in Hollywood directing big-budget special effects movies. Not surprisingly, his later films are a lot tamer than his early ones, but then under the circumstances, he's probably as adventurous as is possible for a filmmaker in his position to be. The alternative would be to work outside the system, as Guy Maddin mostly does, but to do so would be financially disastrous. When Maddin taught a class at the University of Toronto in 2020 just before the pandemic, he said on the first day that he only took the job because he needed money to pay the rent.Yeah, 2049 in particular feels about as "challenging" a movie that Hollywood's likely to release these days with that sort of budget, and that's with it being a sequel to a well-known older film (and its box office failure means that we're even less likely to get much more like it). Still, like I said, I think he's been doing well recently, and I'd rather he keep doing good sequels/adaptations of well-known properties than get swallowed up by the MCU, or offer up blatant nostalgia porn like JJ Abrams, you know?

[baby doll]

Very interesting, thank you!

And that is kind of disgusting about Maddin. I can't believe a Canadian staple like him is struggling.From what I hear, it's pretty much impossible to make a living as a filmmaker in Canada, which is why most Canadian filmmakers have day jobs (Greyson heads the film department at York University) or go to the US (not only Villeneuve but also Jean-Marc Vallée). The thing about Maddin in particular is that he works in this ambiguous no man's land between the commercial mainstream and hardcore experimental cinema, and he's had something of an on-again, off-again relationship with Telefilm his entire career. He got a completion grant for Tales of the Gimli Hospital only after principal photography was complete (and to get that, he had to submit a script for a film that had been shot without one), and The Saddest Music in the World got funded because it was based on a story idea by Kazuo Ishiguro, had several big stars, and Atom Egoyan was an executive producer, whereas for most of his other films he's had to find alternative sources of funding: Brand upon the Brain! was produced by a not-for-profit film company in the US and The Green Fog was commissioned by the San Francisco International Film Festival. (He wound up posting the latter film on his Vimeo page (https://vimeo.com/356966508) because he was so frustrated with how the film's distributor was handling the film.)

[Philip J. Fry]

1457725816213839872
Amazing.

[StuSmallz]

Anyone doing anything special for Noirvember this year?

[DFA1979]

All That Heaven Allows is a near great flick. I haven't gotten around to other Sirk films, yet.

[DFA1979]

That's too bad about Canadian cinema. Art is great yet it may not pay the bills, I guess.

[DFA1979]

https://i.ibb.co/YZKF1NP/https-blogs-images-forbes-com-scottmendelson-files-2016-09-maxresdefault-1.jpg (https://ibb.co/ZmwpFfG)

​Why are they here?

Time; it's one of those inescapable, universal concepts, one that varies so wildly from one person to the next, but at the same time, it's also one of the most rigid, unyielding things in existence. I mean, just think about it; no matter how rich or poor you are, or how powerful or insignificant or whatever other individual traits a person has possessed, no one in the history of the human race has ever had any amount of control over the nature of time, as it's a river that only ever flows in the same forward direction, washing away everyone and thing in its ceaseless tide, and no matter how pivotal or how much emotional power a moment may hold for you, once it's gone, it's gone forever, its fleeting existence swept away by that merciless river. It's an absolutely humbling concept to contemplate, but one that Denis Villeneuve's Arrival challenges by asking "What if that river... didn't flow in one direction?", a question that has earth-shaking repercussions for both its characters and for us as viewers, as the film shatters both our emotions and our perceptions of reality at the same time, with its tale of human fragility that is forever transformed by visitors from far beyond the stars.

It tells the story of Louise Banks, a linguist who is struggling to recover from the recent death of her daughter, until she's snapped out of her daily stupor by the arrival of twelve alien spacecrafts around the world, an event which leads the government to recruit Banks to use her considerable knowledge of language to devise a way to communicate with the reclusive, foreboding extraterrestrials, and find an answer to the question that the rest of the world is hastily racing to answer: "Why are they here?".

However, as Louise gradually learns the intimidatingly complex language of these visitors, her awareness of the world around her slowly begins to transform, a change which not only radically alters Banks on a personal level, but our perception of the film itself, as what we thought we knew about this story is irrevocably changed. In this, the film uses our linear experience of time against us in a brilliant creative decision, one that I'm loathe to go into any further detail about in fears of spoiling Arrival any further, and ruin the aspect that has left the film lingering so vividly in my head since the first time I experienced it, as, like the best Science-Fiction, this is a film bursting at the seams with absolutely endless possibilities, and big, bold, thought-provoking IDEAS, while also always respecting our intelligence, and refusing to over-explain or hold our hands through its uniquely, beautifully fractured plot.

Not that the story machinations are the only thing I love about Arrival, mind you, as another aspect that stands out is the positive twist it places on the familiar, time-worn narrative of aliens invading Earth, as, instead of these "invaders" seeking to mindlessly destroy or conquer humanity like so many other works in this genre, the ones in Arrival instead peacefully visit the planet in order to teach us in various ways, not only how to communicate in their insanely complicated language of ornate circles, but also to get the various, distrusting nations of the world to cooperate in the process, affirming humanity's ability to cross artificial lines such as language and arbitrary national borders, and put aside our petty, meaningless differences for the good of all mankind.

Additionally, I also have to admire the fundamentally down-to-Earth (no pun intended) approach Arrival takes to its central premise, as it refuses to become overly America-centric and lose sight of the big geo-political picture even its mostly single location narrative, as it takes an incredibly plausible look at how the various nations of the Earth would likely react to this scenario. In this way, the film plays out a bit like a thinking man's version of Independence Day (a particularly apt bit of irony, seeing as how Arrival was released the same year as a rather irrelevant sequel to that film), as it contrasts alien invasion films of the past with a more thoughtful take on a “first contact” scenario, a fundamentally optimistic, forward-looking one, which succeeds in making you feel like there's hope for the future of the human race, if we could all just start working together as a species for once.

Finally, Arrival excels as a fundamentally overwhelming experience, in both a sensory sense as well as an emotional one, as it takes a cold, sometimes outright menacing tone, one that perfectly captures the terrifying beauty of making such contact, whether it be the sterile, manmade environments that seem as alien as the ones that were actually built by aliens, Jóhann Jóhannsson's foreboding, avant garde score, or the sight of the massive, oval-shaped craft eclipsing the Montana landscape like the black monolith in a certain other Sci-Fi film, while also managing to balance that coldness with a strong emotional warmth, as the film's slow pacing and initially detached, subdued style eventually gives way, and the characters are forever changed by the world-shattering revelations brought about by their experiences, their inner emotional barriers completely demolished in the process.

And, as Max Richter's beautiful composition "On The Nature Of Daylight" begins to play at the end, Arrival achieves the minor miracle of touching our hearts just as much as it's stimulated our minds, as we catch fleeting glimpses of intimate, defining moments in the characters' lives, past, present, and future all blending together into an absolutely overwhelming, heartbreaking kaleidoscope of imagery and emotion, one that I will never, ever forget as long as I live; they have arrived, indeed.

Favorite Moment:


https://youtu.be/h10sJv3IacQ

Final Score: 9
.



Heh I gave that movie a 10/10. Review for it coming whenever I feel like it or get around to it.

[megladon8]

My experience with the Canadian radio and music industries definitely taught me how true what baby doll said about Canadian film is.

The CRTC stifles creativity. Implementing and enforcing "Can Con" (Canadian Content) laws. When I was in radio, all Canadian terrestrial stations were legally required to have 45% of all programming be not only by Canadian artists, but identifiably Canadian Content.

That's why every Canadian TV show (that isn't on a specialty network or service) is usually about an RCMP officer who likes to drink Alexander Keith's with his Native friend while eating maple syrup and hunting moose.

They prioritize Canadiana over quality. And it is legally enforced.

[StuSmallz]

https://i.ibb.co/zX2VFDN/MV5-BMTU0-MTg5-ODEx-NF5-BMl5-Ban-Bn-Xk-Ft-ZTgw-Nj-E5-NTIw-Mj-E-V1.jpg (https://ibb.co/bsv5FD7)


We should've dug deeper than a grave.


While the cinematic and literary roots of Film Noir stretch back well before the 40's, it's only natural that the genre would truly begin to flourish during that decade, as it obviously saw the global devastation of World War II, an event that brought a newfound paranoia and anxiety upon the world, even among the nations that were left relatively unscathed in its wake. And so, keeping that in mind, it only makes sense that Carol Reed's The Third Man had such a close connection to that conflict, as the film expertly balances its status as a living history lesson with being a wonderful piece of entertainment at the same time, telling a fantastic mystery set amongst the rubble of post-war Europe, and becoming one of the greatest Classical-era Noirs ever made in the process, if not, at the risk of hyperbole, the greatest.


It tells the story of Holly Martins, a self-described "hack writer" of pulp Westerns, who travels to Vienna in order to accept some sort of vague job offer from Harry Lime, an old friend of his. However, as soon as the hapless Holly arrives there, he's shocked to learn that Lime recently died, apparently killed in a freak car accident... that is, until a number of details fail to add up, forcing Holly to reopen the closed case himself, connecting with an old flame of Lime's that refuses to burn out, all the while continually dodging the murderous denizens of the local underworld, as he digs ever deeper into the seedy past of his "dead" friend, buried amongst the labyrinthian rubble of a post-war Vienna.


It's a fairly rich, multi-layered mystery, but rather than getting tangled up in unnecessarily convoluted "plot knots" like such genre peers as The Big Sleep, Graham Greene's sharply-written screenplay instead remains streamlined throughout, never becoming overly complicated just for the sake of it, but only throwing new wrinkles into the story when they're strictly needed, which keeps things intriguing without ever overwhelming us in the process. Anyway, speaking of other Noirs, The Third Man also distinguishes itself from them with its unexpected sense of fun, forgoing the fatalism that often characterized the genre with its generally lighter tone, literally from the start, with the close-up of Anton Karas's zither as it begins to play the quirky, iconic score, and continuing with a number of playful or comedic moments throughout, whether it be the sight of a small child leading a mob through the streets of Vienna, a hilarious misunderstanding involving a unwanted chauffer, or the unexpected appearance of a talking parrot at a most inconvenient moment.


All that being said though, there's still absolutely no doubt that The Third Man is a work of Film Noir on the whole, whether it be the deep, monstrously distorted shadows of its high-contrast lighting, or the way that the off-kilter dutch angles of Robert Krasker's virtuosic cinematography create a sort of topsy-turvy, funhouse mirror of reality. And, character-wise, the fresh faced, almost newborn-like naivety of Joseph Cotten's Martins starts to give way to the kind of cynicism we expect from a Noir protagonist, as he's repeatedly splashed with the cold water of Harry's greedy, sociopathic behavior throughout, with Lime himself making a tremendous impact with very little actual screentime, particularly during one of the greatest character reveals ever filmed.


But of course, despite the presence of such screen icons as Orson Welles, the real star here is Vienna itself, as the film was filmed on-location amongst the rubble of the once-glorious national capital, still recovering from the continent-wide post-war "hangover", as a devastated city divided up among the authorities of various post-war powers, with the classy architecture of the buildings that were lucky enough to survive the war, and the rubble of the ones that weren't, providing a concrete maze for the characters to survive, and concealing a new mystery around each and every one of its sharp corners, giving the city just as much character as any of the actual, well, characters. It's this conspiratorial atmosphere the locale provides that further sets The Third Man apart as a film, makes it one of the finest examples of its genre, and ultimately creates an experience that's just as fresh and entertaining today as it was over half a century ago; now, if you'll excuse me, I think I'm going to go get some zither lessons.


Final Score: 10

[Skitch]

Great movie.

[Yxklyx]

Il Sorpasso - what a ride!

[Yxklyx]

Oh, and the connection of Il Sorpasso to Kieslowski's Red. OK, slight(?) but same actor in similar role and same career. One could easily see the character from the former movie being the same as the latter. I have to believe that the casting here was based on the Italian film. Kieslowski is always referencing other films/ideas.

[StuSmallz]

Daniel Day-Lewis and Paul Thomas Anderson are a match made in obsessive heaven (https://www.avclub.com/daniel-day-lewis-and-paul-thomas-anderson-are-a-match-m-1848087424)

[Yxklyx]

...


But of course, despite the presence of such screen icons as Orson Welles, the real star here is Vienna itself, as the film was filmed on-location amongst the rubble of the once-glorious national capital, still recovering from the continent-wide post-war "hangover", as a devastated city divided up among the authorities of various post-war powers, with the classy architecture of the buildings that were lucky enough to survive the war, and the rubble of the ones that weren't, providing a concrete maze for the characters to survive, and concealing a new mystery around each and every one of its sharp corners, giving the city just as much character as any of the actual, well, characters....



enough commas :) ? Reed/Krasker do a similar thing in Odd Man Out where the city becomes a character.

...and that reminds me. Why are there no US films from the late 40s and 50s that show off the baby boom? I've seen several British films that have kids all over the place (A Taste of Honey, Odd Man Out, Tiger Bay).

[StuSmallz]

enough commas :) ? Reed/Krasker do a similar thing in Odd Man Out where the city becomes a character.

...and that reminds me. Why are there no US films from the late 40s and 50s that show off the baby boom? I've seen several British films that have kids all over the place (A Taste of Honey, Odd Man Out, Tiger Bay).What? That sentence would only "flow" worse with less commas, so I think your issue has more to do with the overall length of the sentence, rather than the number of commas I used in it (which I get, but that's just kind of my personal style, you know?). Anyway, I haven't watched Odd Man Out yet, but as far as Reed's other 40's movies go, I did watch The Fallen Idol a while ago, and felt it was quite good on the whole (although in retrospect, it was a warm-up for the greatness that was Man​, of course).

[StuSmallz]

Every Paul Thomas Anderson movie, ranked from worst to best (https://www.avclub.com/every-paul-thomas-anderson-movie-ranked-from-worst-to-1848117857)

[StuSmallz]

Peter Jackson lets his penchant for bloat infect the otherwise terrific The Beatles: Get Back (https://www.avclub.com/peter-jackson-lets-his-penchant-for-bloat-infect-the-ot-1848119305)

[Philip J. Fry]

Man, after 14 years, Michael Clayton remains so, soooo good. I know it came out in a ridiculously stacked year, but it's still quite a shame it's been so overshadowed.

[StuSmallz]

Man, after 14 years, Michael Clayton remains so, soooo good. I know it came out in a ridiculously stacked year, but it's still quite a shame it's been so overshadowed.Well, as far as '07 movies go, (https://letterboxd.com/stusmallz/tag/2007/reviews/) I wouldn't put it on the same level as Zodiac, There Will be Blood, or No Country, but it was still a pretty solid, 8-out-of-10 legal thriller anyway.

[Idioteque Stalker]

A slight tremor hits you where you stand. Might there be a draft? A winter chill? You feel your gorge rise, and you become vaguely irritated. You have felt this way before, as if a series of inane decisions will soon reduce you to a fragile husk. Something's in the air. Certainly it isn't... Wait, could it be?



https://giffiles.alphacoders.com/208/208660.gif



https://i.gifer.com/Wteo.gif



https://i.pinimg.com/originals/a7/95/38/a79538d0685ad58f669eea494b1e0c e6.gif

MADNESS

[StuSmallz]

A slight tremor hits you where you stand. Might there be a draft? A winter chill? You feel your gorge rise, and you become vaguely irritated. You have felt this way before, as if a series of inane decisions will soon reduce you to a fragile husk. Something's in the air. Certainly it isn't... Wait, could it be?



https://giffiles.alphacoders.com/208/208660.gif



https://i.gifer.com/Wteo.gif



https://i.pinimg.com/originals/a7/95/38/a79538d0685ad58f669eea494b1e0c e6.gif

MADNESS...huh?

[Peng]

...huh?

http://matchcut.artboiled.com/showthread.php?8164-Match-Cut-Madness-3-Best-of-the-00s (http://matchcut.artboiled.com/showthread.php?8164-Match-Cut-Madness-3-Best-of-the-00s&highlight=Madness)

You even participated in past threads!

[StuSmallz]

http://matchcut.artboiled.com/showthread.php?8164-Match-Cut-Madness-3-Best-of-the-00s (http://matchcut.artboiled.com/showthread.php?8164-Match-Cut-Madness-3-Best-of-the-00s&highlight=Madness)

You even participated in past threads!Oh, so Stalker's working on one for the 2010's now? Cool.

[Idioteque Stalker]

Damn good splosion in that Mad Max gif.

[StuSmallz]

Damn good splosion in that Mad Max gif.Indeed; it's one of my favorite stunts in a movie that's already full of a ton of great ones already.

[transmogrifier]

Oh, so Stalker's working on one for the 2010's now? Cool.

We'll just fuck it up as usual.

[Peng]

Waiting for its bracket fight:

https://66.media.tumblr.com/b39c65d8d6c140d68db7487fc719a4 5c/tumblr_puviohfZ7z1v72ye8o5_500 .gifv

[StuSmallz]

The best movies of 2001: (https://www.avclub.com/the-best-movies-of-2001-1848148057)

Have the Oscars ever gotten it more wrong than they did in March of 2002, when Tom Hanks handed Best Picture to the treacly, forgettable biopic A Beautiful Mind? Okay, surely they have—the Academy has been making boneheaded calls for just shy of a century. But it’s still difficult to think of many Oscar-night moments as deflating as Ron Howard’s victory over not just four worthier opponents but every superior film his wasn’t competing against. Because 2001 was more than a great year for movies. It was an all-timer, perhaps even filthier with masterpieces than the fabled 1999.

2001 gave us powerhouse studio movies—a pageant of hobbits, monsters, sad robots, and all-star heists, all classing up the multiplex. Musicals got thrillingly, eccentrically modern. Horror experienced a miniature renaissance. Major works arrived from Mexico, Japan, France, Hong Kong, and so many other points on the world-cinema map. The triumphs came in all shapes and sizes, genres and languages. One even came from (gasp) TV.


We considered going to 50 this year. That’s how deep the pool of superlative films released two decades ago runs. What, no Donnie Darko? No Black Hawk Down? No Zoolander? Consider them honorable mentions; each would have made a better Best Picture, too. As usual, we stuck to movies released in America during the calendar year in question, which is why you won’t find Spirited Away or Y Tu Mamá También on the list (look for them next year, when we cite our favorites of 2002), and also why you will find Memento and In The Mood For Love there, despite earlier festival debuts.

What, Fellowship Of The Ring only made it in at #18? Boo-urns! Still, what an amazing year that was on the whole, eh?

[transmogrifier]

It's the AV Club. They are probably angry that the hobbits and dwarves weren't allowed to be played by actual real-life little people and that the orcs are examples of body-shaming by having them all be ugly.

[Skitch]

AV club is the flipside of the coin of bloody disgusting, either way, I don't pick it up.

[baby doll]

Also, The Fellowship of the Rings just isn't that great of a movie. Obviously they had to put it on the list somewhere because this is the internet, and nerds would freak if they didn't, but it's not a movie you can make a strong case for in terms of form and style. Basically what I keep hearing from people is some version of, "Jackson and his collaborators did a pretty good job of getting as much of the book into a movie without overwhelming people who haven't read the books." In other words, it's the most expensive episode of Masterpiece Theatre ever filmed.

[Yxklyx]

Why does Irv leave the "rocker panels" for last when they're looking for the cocaine in the Lincoln Continental?

[StuSmallz]

It's the AV Club. They are probably angry that the hobbits and dwarves weren't allowed to be played by actual real-life little people and that the orcs are examples of body-shaming by having them all be ugly.Well, while I do get tired of the hoary old "evil = ugly" trope, and I'm obviously a fan of The AV Club in general, some of the virtue-signaling there does go a bit overboard at times, especially with Tom Breihan's writing, who I'm otherwise a big fan of. I mean, in his write-up for Guardians Of The Galaxy (https://www.avclub.com/with-guardians-of-the-galaxy-marvel-made-household-nam-1832269320)for his "Age Of Heroes" retrospective on the history of Superhero mnovies, he seriously wrote:


And yes, it’s fucked-up that a black woman as charismatic as Zoe Saldana should have to have blue and green skin in her two biggest roles.

https://i.ibb.co/LZ6Ht3N/giphy.gif (https://imgbb.com/)

It's like, Tom, I love your work in general, but what the fuck?
Also, The Fellowship of the Rings just isn't that great of a movie. Obviously they had to put it on the list somewhere because this is the internet, and nerds would freak if they didn't, but it's not a movie you can make a strong case for in terms of form and style. Basically what I keep hearing from people is some version of, "Jackson and his collaborators did a pretty good job of getting as much of the book into a movie without overwhelming people who haven't read the books." In other words, it's the most expensive episode of Masterpiece Theatre ever filmed.I sincerely doubt they put Fellowship on the list just to placate LOTR nerds, since it was already objectively one of the best-regarded movies of '01 in the first place (besides, if that was the case, then I'd imagine they would've put it a lot higher than just #18). Anyway, just speaking for my own personal opinion of Fellowship, I hadn't read any of the books by the first time I watched it (and knew essentially nothing about the world and lore of Middle Earth in general), so how much of Tolkien's writing Jackon & company did or didn't include in the movie was 100% irrelevant to me personally; I just thought it was a great movie on its terms.

[StuSmallz]

Why does Irv leave the "rocker panels" for last when they're looking for the cocaine in the Lincoln Continental?You're talking about that scene from The French Connection, I assume?

[baby doll]

I sincerely doubt they put Fellowship on the list just to placate LOTR nerds, since it was already objectively one of the best-regarded movies of '01 in the first place (besides, if that was the case, then I'd imagine they would've put it a lot higher than just #18). Anyway, just speaking for my own personal opinion of Fellowship, I hadn't read any of the books by the first time I watched it (and knew essentially nothing about the world and lore of Middle Earth in general), so how much of Tolkien's writing Jackon & company did or didn't include in the movie was 100% irrelevant to me personally; I just thought it was a great movie on its terms.And what terms would those be exactly? Just as straight-ahead blockbuster filmmaking, Jackson's direction didn't strike me as particularly inventive or purposeful. The trilogy has a whole basically has four kinds of scenes, repeated ad nauseam: epic battles between the forces of good and evil, expository dialogue scenes filmed TV-style in repetitive alternating close-ups, helicopter shots of Hobbits trudging over mountains, and portentous close-ups of Ian McKellan intoning nuggets of timeless wisdom.

[transmogrifier]

Well, while I do get tired of the hoary old "evil = ugly" trope, and I'm obviously a fan of The AV Club in general, some of the virtue-signaling there does go a bit overboard at times, especially with Tom Breihan's writing, who I'm otherwise a big fan of. I mean, in his write-up for Guardians Of The Galaxy (https://www.avclub.com/with-guardians-of-the-galaxy-marvel-made-household-nam-1832269320)for his "Age Of Heroes" retrospective on the history of Superhero mnovies, he seriously wrote:.

Sam Barsanti may be one of the worst writers to ever do it for a living. His mix of condescending haughtiness about social issues, terrible attempts at humor, and bland writing style makes him infuriating. I am sympathetic to a lot of the same causes as the AV Club, but they are exceptionally narrow-minded and intolerant to any types of discussion over anything they find unquestionable, and thus they attract the same sort of people to the comments section. It's funny, Jeff Wells, who is a good writer when he sticks to movies, has gone in the opposite direction by devoting 90% of his blog to being a complete and utter crank about excessive "wokeness" (while still hating Trump) and this has infected his views of movies, where he spends most of the time hating of movies that don't fit his narrow interests - and surprise, surprise, his comments sections attract people who just seem to hate everything.

This is why love Letterboxd - the lack of centralized forums prevents the site from being infected by ideology. It's mostly just people talking about movies.

[Yxklyx]

You're talking about that scene from The French Connection, I assume?

Yeah.

[megladon8]

Zoe Saldana isn't black.

[StuSmallz]

And what terms would those be exactly? Just as straight-ahead blockbuster filmmaking, Jackson's direction didn't strike me as particularly inventive or purposeful. The trilogy has a whole basically has four kinds of scenes, repeated ad nauseam: epic battles between the forces of good and evil, expository dialogue scenes filmed TV-style in repetitive alternating close-ups, helicopter shots of Hobbits trudging over mountains, and portentous close-ups of Ian McKellan intoning nuggets of timeless wisdom.I don't necessarily feel PJ's directing was particularly "inventive" either, but it didn't have to be in order for the trilogy to be very well-directed on the whole, because the aesthetic choices he made were still consistently effective, rousing, and dynamic on the whole. And besides that, the main reason why I feel the LOTR movies are great is how well their storytelling balances the epic with the personal, with the huge battles, sweeping landscape shots, and Shore's score providing the wow factor, but with the emotion being provided by the character-centric details, whether it be Arwen's sacrifice of a mortal life for Aragon's love, the confused look Legolas gives after Gandalf dies (since he's an immortal elf who's never seen anyone die in his life), or how it ends on the small note of Frodo saying he's glad that Sam's his friend, as they trudge off towards the dark land of Morder together (and all of that's just in Fellowship alone!). I'm getting the feels right now just thinking about it, I tell ya!
Yeah.Artificially-generated suspense, I suppose? I dunno; I was never a big fan of that movie in general anyway. Still, it isn't as egregious as that part in Basic Instinct where Michael Douglas thinks someone is lying to him because he can't find any record of a person having attended a certain school, but then it turns out he just misheard the name he was given in the first place; c'mon movie!

[StuSmallz]

Zoe Saldana isn't black.The man can't even get acting "woke" right, eh?

[megladon8]

I lol'd.

[baby doll]

I don't necessarily feel PJ's directing was particularly "inventive" either, but it didn't have to be in order for the trilogy to be very well-directed on the whole, because the aesthetic choices he made were still consistently effective, rousing, and dynamic on the whole. And besides that, the main reason why I feel the LOTR movies are great is how well their storytelling balances the epic with the personal, with the huge battles, sweeping landscape shots, and Shore's score providing the wow factor, but with the emotion being provided by the character-centric details, whether it be Arwen's sacrifice of a mortal life for Aragon's love, the confused look Legolas gives after Gandalf dies (since he's an immortal elf who's never seen anyone die in his life), or how it ends on the small note of Frodo saying he's glad that Sam's his friend, as they trudge off towards the dark land of Morder together (and all of that's just in Fellowship alone!). I'm getting the feels right now just thinking about it, I tell ya!"Rousing" and "dynamic" are probably the last words I'd use to describe Jackson's aesthetic choices ("effective" depends on what effect is intended); on the contrary, the film's visual and aural rhetoric--the sweeping helicopter shots and muted colour scheme and bombastic orchestral score--seem designed to cow the viewer into submission, and to make them feel that what's happening on the screen is really, really significant. (This is not a trilogy one could accuse of being light on its feet.) There's an underlying insecurity lurking behind Jackson's stylistic choices, as if he were worried that viewers might look at this story of goblins and wizards and whatnot and see it as simply light entertainment rather than a grand epic on par with Wagner's Ring cycle, and to compensate, Jackson turns up the music and turns down the lighting (especially in the second film, which is almost unrelievedly nocturnal). The end result is that the plot devolves into a series of Big Moments in which this impossibly large army dukes it out with that impossibly large army and someone gives an inspirational speech as much to the camera as to the other characters, which have the effect of crowding out the character-centric details you refer to.

[Ezee E]

I'd like to see some of the woke critics read their work or speak to it out loud and see if they can keep their straight face.

[megladon8]

99% of them are white people speaking on behalf of others, which I think makes it even worse and cringier.

[DFA1979]

We'll just fuck it up as usual.

Well that's just your opinion, man.

[StuSmallz]

"Rousing" and "dynamic" are probably the last words I'd use to describe Jackson's aesthetic choices ("effective" depends on what effect is intended); on the contrary, the film's visual and aural rhetoric--the sweeping helicopter shots and muted colour scheme and bombastic orchestral score--seem designed to cow the viewer into submission, and to make them feel that what's happening on the screen is really, really significant. (This is not a trilogy one could accuse of being light on its feet.) There's an underlying insecurity lurking behind Jackson's stylistic choices, as if he were worried that viewers might look at this story of goblins and wizards and whatnot and see it as simply light entertainment rather than a grand epic on par with Wagner's Ring cycle, and to compensate, Jackson turns up the music and turns down the lighting (especially in the second film, which is almost unrelievedly nocturnal). The end result is that the plot devolves into a series of Big Moments in which this impossibly large army dukes it out with that impossibly large army and someone gives an inspirational speech as much to the camera as to the other characters, which have the effect of crowding out the character-centric details you refer to.LOTR isn't just light entertainment, though; it's a gargantuan Fantasy Epic (and one of the most iconic ones ever created, to boot), about the struggle for the fate of literally an entire world. In that context, I feel that the aesthetic choices Jackson went with were extremely suitable for it, and complaining about helicopter shots or bombastic music in a trilogy like it feels like saying "Oh, an omnious score, slowly creeping cinematography, and disturbing imagery... in a Horror ​movie?!".

;)

[baby doll]

LOTR isn't just light entertainment, though; it's a gargantuan Fantasy Epic (and one of the most iconic ones ever created, to boot), about the struggle for the fate of literally an entire world. In that context, I feel that the aesthetic choices Jackson went with were extremely suitable for it, and complaining about helicopter shots or bombastic music in a trilogy like it feels like saying "Oh, an omnious score, slowly creeping cinematography, and disturbing imagery... in a Horror ​movie?!".

;)The best horror movies, such as Val Lewton's '40s B movies, often do without clichéd visual/aural rhetoric, and are all the better for it. Moreover, the effectiveness of a particular stylistic device depends in large part on its being rare. One jump scare (or helicopter shot) can be effective but twenty in the same film is simply tiresome. Apart from being redundant (surely one of the most iconic gargantuan fantasy epics ever created doesn't need to remind us how iconically gargantuan it is), the problem with Jackson's rhetoric is that he keeps drawing on the same limited menu of devices over and over again, which after nine hours start to get seriously old and lose whatever effectiveness they originally possessed.

[transmogrifier]

Two weeks until I'm free for 10 weeks. Can't wait to actually catch up on some movies (though I am getting a jump on this by watching a Power of the Dog and French Dispatch double-header at the theater tomorrow and Don't Look Up at the theater on Saturday).

I plan to watch spend one full day planted in front of the TV watching the extended editions of LOTR just to spite Baby Doll (I joke; I was planning to do that anyway. The spite is just an added bonus :))

[baby doll]

I plan to watch spend one full day planted in front of the TV watching the extended editions of LOTR just to spite Baby Doll (I joke; I was planning to do that anyway. The spite is just an added bonus :))What movies other people choose to watch is none of my concern. You do you.

[Philip J. Fry]

1470614627490963457
Oh no! I hope she recovers.

[Philip J. Fry]

1470743991306100740

[StanleyK]

Paul Verhoeven:

Turkish Delight - 4
Katie Tippel - 5.5
Soldier of Orange - 7
Spetters - 5.5
The Fourth Man - 8.5
Flesh + Blood - 7
RoboCop - 7
Total Recall - 8.5
Basic Instinct - 5.5
Showgirls - 2.5
Starship Troopers - 7
Hollow Man - 4
Black Book - 7
Elle - 8.5
Benedetta - 5.5



Pretty good filmmaker overall, but maybe a bit overhyped. Critical reevaluation of something like Showgirls is going too far imo.

[dreamdead]

Watched Vivian Qu's Angels Wear White on the Criterion Channel. Highly recommended for those who enjoy films like Jia's, where the villain (of sexual assault) is visible early and then you wait to see how extensively the film will interrogate Chinese culture and suggest that justice is possible. There's a few instances where a lingering shot makes too plain the social critique (a shot reminding us that the police stations exists to "Serve the People"), but the film has great pacing and is overall understated. Happy that I clicked on it last night...

[baby doll]

Pretty good filmmaker overall, but maybe a bit overhyped. Critical reevaluation of something like Showgirls is going too far imo.It's not boring.

[Idioteque Stalker]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vfb_DHKaWUQ

[Idioteque Stalker]

An animator fed up with all the detail work on Akira snuck in a complaint. (https://kotaku.com/decades-later-an-animator-complaint-discovered-in-akir-1848272965)

"Why do we have to fill in this far! Knock it off! Enough"


lololol

[StuSmallz]

https://i.ibb.co/0mwyckW/there-will-be-blood.png (https://ibb.co/zQkVr1L)

I have a competition in me... I

want no one else to succeed.

Oil; the precious liquid bubbles away, lurking underground as far as the eye can see across the desolate, turn-of-the-century California landscape, as people are quite literally baptized and buried in it, so pervasive its presence is, driving men mad with a lustful, insatiable greed, and planting fantasies in their heads of becoming impossibly rich from what is essentially a raping of this rich, virgin land. One of the men driven by this madness is Daniel Plainview, whose outward mask of benevolent capitalism and civility is revealed to mask a soul that's even darker than the black gold he lusts for, and whose greed and utter contempt for the rest of humanity is the central driving force behind Paul Thomas Anderson's There Will Be Blood, an absolutely epic, monolithic historical drama that towers over cinema as tall as the derricks looming over the very landscape.

Blood tells the story of Plainview, a relentlessly misanthropic prospector looking to exploit the naive, innocent locals caught in the middle of the Southern California oil boom of the early 20th century, using any number of deceiftful machinations he can, along with the friendly facade of running a family business with his besuited "son" (who's really the orphan of a worker who died on one of Plainview's worksites), all in order to ruthlessly screw people out of their own land. A tip on the location of a fertile new oilfield brings Plainview to Little Boston, a small, rural community held underneath the sway of Eli Sunday, a fanatical, scrupleless local "faith healer", who's looking to, whether in a religious manner or just an old-fashioned financial sense, profit off of Plainview's presence in his community, just the same as Plainview desires to profit off the community itself. And, as the bitter conflict between the two men and the insitutions they represent grows more and more, and the various personal turmoils he faces keep piling up, the nature of his true, murderous misanthropy is revealed more and more, and Plainview's public mask of being a polite, genial businessman begins to irrevocably slip.

It's a fantastic characterization on the whole, but not because Plainview fundamentally changes all that much as a human being, as it becomes obvious that he started off as a hateful man and just gets worse as the film unfolds, and there aren't many moments here where it seems like he could truly redeem himself. Rather, his personal journey is great to witness here because of the striking, undeniably powerful ways in which it's executed, not least of which comes from Daniel Day-Lewis's iconic, Oscar-winning portrayal, in an absolutely commanding performance, to the point where it seems less like acting, and more like Paul Thomas Anderson invented a time machine and brought Plainview straight from 1911 to present day merely for authenticity's sake. It truly is one of film's all-time greatest feats of acting, an overwhelming tour-de-force of oily, slyly manipulative tones, barely concealed hatreds, and cerebral bore stares that could pierce titanium, and, while I have to admit that Lewis does go just a bit too over-the-top with his histrionics during the film's epilogue, for the most part he's successful in 100% embodying the role here, and it should come as no surprise that, even as one of most venerated actors of his generation, his Plainview has still become one of the most beloved performances of his entire career.

Of course, the other aspects of Blood are equally important in making it a great movie, especially its overall style, which fascinates with its emphasis on subtly sweeping, slowly developing tracking shots that manage to impress while still restraining themselves from becoming overly showy, or the long, extended takes that allow Anderson's richly-written dialogue and the actors deftly sparring with it room to breathe, or the wide, expansive vistas of barren California landscapes, which sharply contrast with the facial close-ups so intense, you can practically smell the sweat coming off of the actors. And all of that isn't even mentioning the disconcerting hum of Johnny Greenwood's borderline avant-garde score, which creates an overall effect that can only be described as "hypnotic", and, to this day, it's still a great injustice in that not only did this score not win the Oscar for Best Score the following year, it wasn't even nominated, which just goes to demonstrate the sort of dull, conservative attitude toward cinema that dominated The Academy at the time (and still does, to a certain extent).

And finally, There Will Be Blood excels through the strong conflict between its central personalities of Daniel and Eli, and the institutions they represent, though Anderson often shows the two mortal enemies (and the forces driving them) to be barely distinguishable from each other, if distinguishable at all. Plainview is the consumerate American capitalist, increasingly erratic as his personal fortune grows, unabashedly greedy to the point of murder, and only concerned with his own financial success even when his own workers, friends, and even family suffer as a result, while Sunday, instead of spreading the love of the God that he claims to believe in, is only really concerned with personal glory, whether it be using the presence of oil in Little Boston to wring extra money out of Daniel to use on his church, trying to exploit the opening of the local oil well in order to promote himself, and immediately renouncing his faith when forced to beg for help by Daniel. The entire affair proves to be a compelling commentary on the two defining institutions of American life, wrapped inside of a fascinating dual-character study that spans decades, inside one of the best films of the 2000's, and, since I feel I've written more than enough about this movie by now, I suppose you could say that I'm finished? Yes, I believe I am, so... I'm finished!!!

And go watch There Will Be Blood, by the way.

Final Score: 9.25
.

[StuSmallz]

Five Ways The Lord Of The Rings Trilogy Changed Blockbusters Forever: on the 20th anniversary of Fellowship Of The Ring, we look back at the legacy of Peter Jackson's fantasy epic (https://redirect.viglink.com/?format=go&jsonp=vglnk_164074118629911&key=71fe2139a887ad501313cd8cce 3053c5&libId=kxquwz340102ylrr000MLhuf ithkbqrqz&loc=https%3A%2F%2Fglobaldomina tion.freeforums.net%2Fposts%2F recent&v=1&out=https%3A%2F%2Feditorial.ro ttentomatoes.com%2Farticle%2F5-ways-the-lord-of-the-rings-changed-blockbusters-forever%2F&title=GD%20%7C%20is%20dead&txt=5%20Ways%20The%20Lord%20Of %20The%20Rings%20Trilogy%20Cha nged%20Blockbusters%20Forever% 3A%20on%20the%2020th%20anniver sary%20of%20Fellowship%20Of%20 The%20Ring%2C%20we%20look...)

[Philip J. Fry]

1475822382044659713

[StuSmallz]

Rest in peace, Bloody Sam... (https://letterboxd.com/stusmallz/tag/peckinpah/reviews/)

[StuSmallz]

Tilda Swinton hears a strange sound in the magnificently mysterious Memoria (https://www.avclub.com/tilda-swinton-hears-a-strange-sound-in-the-magnificentl-1848243930)

[Skitch]

Hey all, A Bittersweet Life is on Kanopy. Highly recommend.

[Ivan Drago]

Tilda Swinton hears a strange sound in the magnificently mysterious Memoria (https://www.avclub.com/tilda-swinton-hears-a-strange-sound-in-the-magnificentl-1848243930)

Can't wait for others to see this.

[Idioteque Stalker]

Can't wait for others to see this.

Grrrrr

[StuSmallz]

Mad Max: Fury Road might already be the best Action movie ever made
(https://www.avclub.com/mad-max-fury-road-might-already-be-the-best-action-mov-1820691831)

[DFA1979]

Look I love Fury Road, but no. Not even close.

[Skitch]

I love Fury Road, but....the "best action movie" (whatever that means) would have to be Asian, right?

[StuSmallz]

Look I love Fury Road, but no. Not even close.What's your favorite, then?
I love Fury Road, but....the "best action movie" (whatever that means) would have to be Asian, right?Not for me, because if I had to choose a #1 Action movie, (https://letterboxd.com/stusmallz/list/favorite-action-movies-ranked-reviewed/detail/) it would be Raiders Of The Lost Ark (sorry, baby doll!), but Fury Road isn't far off from it, if I'm being honest.

[DFA1979]

Terminator 2, Die Hard, The Killer and Hard Boiled are all better than Fury Road. As is John Wick Chapter 2 and Enter The Dragon. I still think the first Mad Max is the best in the series.

[StuSmallz]

Terminator 2, Die Hard, The Killer and Hard Boiled are all better than Fury Road. As is John Wick Chapter 2 and Enter The Dragon. I still think the first Mad Max is the best in the series.I like all of those movies as well, to one degree or another (especially T2), but I still think Fury Road has at least a slightly greater combination of style, substance, and great action than all of them, so I still have to go with it. Anyway, as for the Mad Max series (https://www.movieforums.com/community/showthread.php?anchor=1&p=2265906#post2265906) specifically, the original is a pretty solid foundation for the franchise, but still suffers somewhat from a lack of action due to the lack of budget, while The Road Warrior was the first truly great entry, and Beyond Thunderdome concluded the trilogy on a softer, more disappointing note (which Fury Road fortunately rectified with something of a series "mulligan", if you will).

[megladon8]

Spectre is a 60s Bond film through and through. Knowingly silly when it wants to be, while continuing the serialization that has made Craig's films unique.

That first Spectre meeting is a standout scene. Recreating the beats of the old school Blofeld scenes while channeling...Eyes Wide Shut? Maybe Kubrick's swan song is still lingering in my mind having rewatched it recently, but I got some strong vibes in this scene.

Some disturbingly bad CGI aside, I really liked this one.

[Yxklyx]

What do people here think of Imamura? I didn't realize he made so many films and Criterion has many of them for streaming. Pigs and Battleships was great!

#1 : Fury Road
#2 : Raiders of the Lost Ark
#3 : Hard Boiled

[baby doll]

What do people here think of Imamura? I didn't realize he made so many films and Criterion has many of them for streaming. Pigs and Battleships was great!Pigs and Battleships and The Insect Woman are both great. A Man Vanishes has some interesting things in it but it struck me as a bit long and drawn out the one time I saw it. Profound Desire of the Gods is worth checking out. I saw his version of The Ballad of Narayama before Kinoshita's and liked it a lot. I saw Black Rain on 35mm nearly twenty years ago and remember liking it at the time. I was bored by both Warm Water Under a Red Bridge and his segment from September 11 (though again I haven't seen the latter in almost twenty years and might be more sympathetic to it today). I still haven't seen Intentions of Murder, The Pornographers: Introduction to Anthropology, The History of Postwar Japan as Told by a Bar Hostess, Vengeance Is Mine, The Eel, or Dr. Akagi, which are all widely considered major works.

[Yxklyx]

The Insect Woman was indeed really good. Hah, so I finally got through a Rivette film - known for making very very long ones, he actually made a short in '56 called Le Coup du berger (Checkmate on letterboxd) and per one of the commenters: "The climax occurs at a party where the guests include Claude Chabrol, Jean-Luc Godard and Francois Truffaut..."

[transmogrifier]

So, director Michael Sarnoski makes a splash with Pig, his intriguing, thoughtful debut (apparently; I haven't seen it). What is he going to follow it up with? A Quiet Place 3.

And many posters at reddit are really happy with that. Mainstream cinema is fucked, really. Basically, directors have one shot to make a splash, and then they are funnelled into IP franchises as quickly as possible. And that is all the typical audience wants - interesting voices all singing the same tune.

[DFA1979]

It doesn't help that all most theaters get is franchise blockbusters. The pandemic probably killed off a lot of theaters.

[Yxklyx]

So, director Michael Sarnoski makes a splash with Pig, his intriguing, thoughtful debut (apparently; I haven't seen it). What is he going to follow it up with? A Quiet Place 3.

And many posters at reddit are really happy with that. Mainstream cinema is fucked, really. Basically, directors have one shot to make a splash, and then they are funnelled into IP franchises as quickly as possible. And that is all the typical audience wants - interesting voices all singing the same tune.

Yea, and David Robert Mitchell is working on a superhero movie...

[baby doll]

At the risk of being that guy on the internet who goes on longwinded rants about how postmodernism is the devil, I think the idea, which I agree with in principle, that high art isn't necessarily better than low art--and therefore, super-hero movies, comic books, and video games are just as much works of art as the films of Antonioni, Ozu, and Sembène--is often used as an excuse by incurious moviegoers for never watching anything even remotely challenging. It's not the case, as some op-ed writers would have us believe, that there aren't any guilty pleasures anymore (https://www.theatlantic.com/culture/archive/2021/12/emily-paris-netflix-season-2/621128/), but rather what qualifies as a guilty pleasure has flip-flopped: if you like trashy reality shows, you're a good person, especially if you can make the case--which is very easy to do--that said show advances some cherished progressive cause (e.g., queer representation), but if you like reading Joseph Conrad novels, you're a snob and a racist. Even having aesthetic standards is in itself seen as racist, sexist, classist, etc.; therefore, to claim that Wagner's operas are aesthetically richer than the collected works of Beyoncé marks one as a reactionary white supremacist. Back in the '50s and '60s, it was still possible to shame people into seeing auteur films by Bergman, Buñuel, and Satyajit Ray, because it was commonly thought that watching trashy exploitation movies wasn't a suitable pastime for educated adults, but now anything goes--except, that is, watching anything that's actually good or stating that L'Année dernière Ã* Marienbad, Persona, and Le Charme discret de la bourgeoisie are just better than, aesthetically superior to, any Marvel movie.

[transmogrifier]

Except, that is, watching anything that's actually good or stating that L'Année dernière Ã* Marienbad, Persona, and Le Charme discret de la bourgeoisie are just better than, aesthetically superior to, any Marvel movie.

Disclaimer: I have ranted on this topic before, so please feel free to skip on to the next post :)

This is the key to me. Marvel fans (for example, in general, on Reddit, not here... the usual disclaimers) absolutely bridle at anyone suggesting that the movies are deficient in certain ways or that raising a generation of 30 to 40 year olds who ONLY care about those movies or movies like them is not to the benefit of cinema in general, yet those same people are more than happy to shit on all manner of other films (e.g., DCU films, Spike Lee films, musicals etc) without ever seeing the hypocrisy. I actually don't care what other people choose to like - that is totally up to them, and while I bemoan trends such as the disappearance of mainstream adult comedies as a theater force, etc. you can't force people to watch them, so it is what it is. What I hate with film discussion is those who get ANGRY when anyone does not fall in line and praise whatever mainstream thing they like. Like, personal insults angry, while at the same time playing the victim and claiming that the critic is trying to "ruin fun" or whatever nonsense self-defense mechanism they have.

Okay, that's it. I promise to drop this topic for at least the rest of the year :)

[Skitch]

Dude, the year just started :p

While I dig all the comic book movies, I totally agree with you.

I was the kid getting slapped around and called nerd for hiding comic books inside class books in school, so I'm living in heaven right now...but I'm also burdened with an internet critics eye, so I don't deny the flaws. I also know comic book stuff isn't everybody's bag, there's a rather heavy suspension of disbelief aspect that some of us are cool with, and others aren't (which is totally understandable).

[transmogrifier]

I was the kid getting slapped around and called nerd for hiding comic books inside class books in school

Which is much worse that anything that I have to complain about. The weight of history was on your side after all :)

[Morris Schæffer]

Disclaimer: I have ranted on this topic before, so please feel free to skip on to the next post :)

This is the key to me. Marvel fans (for example, in general, on Reddit, not here... the usual disclaimers) absolutely bridle at anyone suggesting that the movies are deficient in certain ways or that raising a generation of 30 to 40 year olds who ONLY care about those movies or movies like them is not to the benefit of cinema in general, yet those same people are more than happy to shit on all manner of other films (e.g., DCU films, Spike Lee films, musicals etc) without ever seeing the hypocrisy. I actually don't care what other people choose to like - that is totally up to them, and while I bemoan trends such as the disappearance of mainstream adult comedies as a theater force, etc. you can't force people to watch them, so it is what it is. What I hate with film discussion is those who get ANGRY when anyone does not fall in line and praise whatever mainstream thing they like. Like, personal insults angry, while at the same time playing the victim and claiming that the critic is trying to "ruin fun" or whatever nonsense self-defense mechanism they have.

Okay, that's it. I promise to drop this topic for at least the rest of the year :)

Reading this post, and having found the last 3-4 Marvel flicks pretty exhausting except Spiderman NWH, I will say that watching season 2 of the punisher right now feels like a massively powerful antidote. :)

[Yxklyx]

Dude, the year just started :p

While I dig all the comic book movies, I totally agree with you.

I was the kid getting slapped around and called nerd for hiding comic books inside class books in school, so I'm living in heaven right now...but I'm also burdened with an internet critics eye, so I don't deny the flaws. I also know comic book stuff isn't everybody's bag, there's a rather heavy suspension of disbelief aspect that some of us are cool with, and others aren't (which is totally understandable).

I agree with baby doll - but I also feel that the super-hero genre is saturated. I like some super heroes films too and am somewhat interested in Mitchell's take.

[Irish]

Back in the '50s and '60s, it was still possible to shame people into seeing auteur films by Bergman, Buñuel, and Satyajit Ray, because it was commonly thought that watching trashy exploitation movies wasn't a suitable pastime for educated adults, but now anything goes--except, that is, watching anything that's actually good or stating that L'Année dernière Ã* Marienbad, Persona, and Le Charme discret de la bourgeoisie are just better than, aesthetically superior to, any Marvel movie.

Can't rep you again for some reason but this was a great post. (And personally, I wouldn't mind a long winded rant about how postmodernism is the devil. I might even make one myself).

This part at the end tho caught my eye, because what qualifies as "anything that's actually good" is obviously up for debate and also because I think such comparisons are always a little ... wonky? Between ~60 year old international arthouse cinema and the current blockbuster climate, I mean. We got corporate behemoths sitting on culture now. A 1:1 comparison doesn't make sense to me.

Like: "7 Men from Now," "The Tale of Zatoichi," and "Man in the Shadows" are all from a similar period as some of the films you named (roughly '57 to '62), all of them cheaply made B-movies, and all of them could probably go toe to toe in terms of craft and care with your average workaday nouvelle vague whatever. There's great sequences in these movies, and technique --- camera, lighting, editing --- is used to underline the material, not supplant it. I don't know what else anyone could want from the movies beyond a good story well told.

[baby doll]

Can't rep you again for some reason but this was a great post. (And personally, I wouldn't mind a long winded rant about how postmodernism is the devil. I might even make one myself).

This part at the end tho caught my eye, because what qualifies as "anything that's actually good" is obviously up for debate and also because I think such comparisons are always a little ... wonky? Between ~60 year old international arthouse cinema and the current blockbuster climate, I mean. We got corporate behemoths sitting on culture now. A 1:1 comparison doesn't make sense to me.

Like: "7 Men from Now," "The Tale of Zatoichi," and "Man in the Shadows" are all from a similar period as some of the films you named (roughly '57 to '62), all of them cheaply made B-movies, and all of them could probably go toe to toe in terms of craft and care with your average workaday nouvelle vague whatever. There's great sequences in these movies, and technique --- camera, lighting, editing --- is used to underline the material, not supplant it. I don't know what else anyone could want from the movies beyond a good story well told.I haven't seen the films you're referring to, but I think the important point here is that you're making a case for these films in terms of their aesthetic merit, which I haven't seen anyone do for contemporary blockbusters, or at least not very persuasively. As for making one-to-one comparisons between corporate blockbusters and old art house movies, obviously it's something of an apples and oranges comparison, but if we're going to take the pluralist position that super-hero movies, comic books, YA novels, and video games are all Art, I think it's incumbent upon people who champion such works to make the case that the best examples of these genres offer aesthetic experiences comparable in richness with, for instance, the novels of Jane Austen and the paintings of Caravaggio. Life is short and there's a lot of art to engage with; "good for its genre" just doesn't cut it for me.

[Irish]

but if we're going to take the pluralist position that super-hero movies, comic books, YA novels, and video games are all Art, I think it's incumbent upon people who champion such works to make the case that the best examples of these genres offer aesthetic experiences comparable in richness with, for instance, the novels of Jane Austen and the paintings of Caravaggio.

I dunno .. I see that bolded part there as a big leap, and as a mistake on your part (and trans', even though I agree with you both).

You're engaging with a weirdly low brow argument and doing it on somebody else's terms. Cf: the whole fuss around Scorsese v Marvel.

Not everything is art and it doesn't need to be, either. I always wanna ask the stans why such-and-such requires a specific status to be worthy of attention. Can't it just be good craft? There's value in that and the work is still just as cool.


I think it's incumbent upon people who champion such works to make the case that the best examples of these genres offer aesthetic experiences comparable in richness with, for instance, the novels of Jane Austen and the paintings of Caravaggio.

Not sure why something would need to be best-in-class (Austen, Carravaggio, etc) to be worth attention, either. Also not sure that's what you meant to imply.

I agree claims to superiority should be backed up. On the other hand, I think the reference points here are all over the place. For one, it seems like the North American cultural memory only stretches back 20 or 25 years ... and man that ain't pretty. You can drop Goddard's or Sirk's or Powell's or any other name you like into a conversation and get nothing back but a blank stare. So now what? You gotta teach Remedial Cinema Studies 101 before you can even have a conversation...

Because if you look at the last 25 years of mainstream Hollywood, with it's broad appeal and lowest common denominator, the Marvel shit doesn't appear half bad. I'd personally rather watch "Generic Marvel Movie #29" than "Michael Bay Shits on Screen, Part XVIII."

For two, there's a whole lotta baggage around this material (and the unabashed love of it) that comes straight from the comic books. A lot of those reference points are junk, but I'd seriously put up "Watchmen" or "Dark Phoenix" or Frank Miller's runs on "Daredevil" and "Batman" against any other 20th century American art you could name. Without hesitating.

[Skitch]

I haven't really commented on the Scorsese v Marvel thing because I've found the whole thing...odd. I don't see why Marvel fans (or whatever) care what anyone thinks. I have no problem liking comic book movies and Scorsese, at the same time! I must be a wizard! :p

Again, I totally get it if people aren't into the comic book movies.

[baby doll]

I dunno .. I see that bolded part there as a big leap, and as a mistake on your part (and trans', even though I agree with you both).

You're engaging with a weirdly low brow argument and doing it on somebody else's terms. Cf: the whole fuss around Scorsese v Marvel.

Not everything is art and it doesn't need to be, either. I always wanna ask the stans why such-and-such requires a specific status to be worthy of attention. Can't it just be good craft? There's value in that and the work is still just as cool.I think in the context of the 1950s and 1960s, toppling the high/low art binary was a positive development since it made it possible to take classical Hollywood cinema, jazz, and other forms of popular culture seriously. It's no longer controversial to argue, for instance, that Howard Hawks is a greater filmmaker than Ingmar Bergman, or as one art critic has claimed, that R. Crumb is the Bruegel of the twentieth century, and that's as it should be. What I take issue with is ditching aesthetic standards altogether, which is fundamentally unserious. Contrary to the article I linked earlier, Justin Beiber is not just as good as Bach, and to claim otherwise is to diminish the importance of music. The implication of such a claim isn't that we should take Beiber seriously but that all music, even Bach's, is something frivolous not worth taking seriously, that the classics are overrated so we might as well listen to garbage.


Not sure why something would need to be best-in-class (Austen, Carravaggio, etc) to be worth attention, either. Also not sure that's what you meant to imply.

I agree claims to superiority should be backed up. On the other hand, I think the reference points here are all over the place. For one, it seems like the North American cultural memory only stretches back 20 or 25 years ... and man that ain't pretty. You can drop Goddard's or Sirk's or Powell's or any other name you like into a conversation and get nothing back but a blank stare. So now what? You gotta teach Remedial Cinema Studies 101 before you can even have a conversation...

Because if you look at the last 25 years of mainstream Hollywood, with it's broad appeal and lowest common denominator, the Marvel shit doesn't appear half bad. I'd personally rather watch "Generic Marvel Movie #29" than "Michael Bay Shits on Screen, Part XVIII."

For two, there's a whole lotta baggage around this material (and the unabashed love of it) that comes straight from the comic books. A lot of those reference points are junk, but I'd seriously put up "Watchmen" or "Dark Phoenix" or Frank Miller's runs on "Daredevil" and "Batman" against any other 20th century American art you could name. Without hesitating.I agree that something doesn't have to be the best-in-class to be worthy of attention (I liked Pain and Gain), but I find it a little depressing how low people's expectations are. Whenever I read think pieces about some dreadful Netflix series that the author knows is bad but can't stop watching, I feel like Sarah Jessica Parker's character in Ed Wood; I just want to shout at the screen, "You people are wasting your lives watching and writing about crap!"

[StuSmallz]

I don't have any particular bias against the Marvel movies personally; in fact, I actually like some of them a lot, (https://letterboxd.com/stusmallz/tag/mcu/reviews/) and I don't see a problem with them or any other "just for fun" popcorn movies being designed primarily just to entertain general audiences, because I think there's always going to be a demand that needs to be filled for movies like that. Not every movie needs to be *insert random arthouse classic here*, after all. However, I do have a problem with the way that they squeeze other movies out, whether it be them taking up multiple screens that should be used to show other films, the way they continue the ongoing stratification of Hollywood productions into either being really big or really small (leaving mid-budget fare increasingly a thing of the past), or the way they even homogenize films within the Superhero genre itself, leaving riskier, more ambitious past examples like The Dark Knight or Logan increasingly unlikely to see in the future, as Disney continues to absorb other intellectual properties into its corporate hivemind... that's what I have a problem with.

[StuSmallz]

Speaking of Marvel...

The best films of 2021, and where film criticism stands in 2022 (https://cultmtl.com/2022/01/the-best-films-of-2021-and-where-film-criticism-stands-in-2022-annette-titane-the-power-of-the-dog/)


Spider-Man‘s dominance on the big screen, which initially seemed like a win, feels like a final blow on the theatrical model. If it wasn’t clear before, it is now: the corporations have won. Disney and Netflix are the de facto rulers of the cultural sphere, and its most ardent fans are also sore winners — unable to concede even the mildest criticism. Film critics, an all-around pathetic group of art lovers, have been reduced to villains. The situation has never felt grimmer.

[baby doll]

I don't have any particular bias against the Marvel movies personally; in fact, I actually like some of them a lot, (https://letterboxd.com/stusmallz/tag/mcu/reviews/) and I don't see a problem with them or any other "just for fun" popcorn movies being designed primarily just to entertain general audiences, because I think there's always going to be a demand that needs to be filled for movies like that. Not every movie needs to be *insert random arthouse classic here*, after all. However, I do have a problem with the way that they squeeze other movies out, whether it be them taking up multiple screens that should be used to show other films, the way they continue the ongoing stratification of Hollywood productions into either being really big or really small (leaving mid-budget fare increasingly a thing of the past), or the way they even homogenize films within the Superhero genre itself, leaving riskier, more ambitious past examples like The Dark Knight or Logan increasingly unlikely to see in the future, as Disney continues to absorb other intellectual properties into its corporate hivemind... that's what I have a problem with.I have no problem with unserious fun; the problem with the super-hero movies I've seen is that, aside from Feuillade's Judex and Franju's 1963 remake, they aren't actually fun, even when they don't take themselves way too seriously. (I actually slightly prefer The Dark Knight Rises over its immediate predecessors--which I regard as the capitalist equivalent of plodding Stalinist epics--not only because it has Anne Hathaway in a skin-tight catsuit, but because the story is so silly it's almost funny, especially the whole prison escape scene with other prisoners inexplicably chanting in unison.) But what I mainly object to is the relativist claim that corporate super-hero movies are just as great as the classics--a claim premised on the notion that the classics aren't really that great and that light entertainment is the most we can expect from art (nevermind that the super-hero movies I've seen manifestly fail to deliver even that).

[transmogrifier]

I dunno .. I see that bolded part there as a big leap, and as a mistake on your part (and trans', even though I agree with you both).

You're engaging with a weirdly low brow argument and doing it on somebody else's terms. Cf: the whole fuss around Scorsese v Marvel.

Not everything is art and it doesn't need to be, either. I always wanna ask the stans why such-and-such requires a specific status to be worthy of attention. Can't it just be good craft? There's value in that and the work is still just as cool.

I just want to point out that I definitely do not think every movie needs to be art. Movies have different purposes, and that is perfectly fine. When I dislike a specific Marvel movie (e.g., Black Panther, Black Widow...), I'm not comparing it to In the Mood for Love or anything like that - I'm judging it on its own terms, and mostly I don't think many of the Marvel movies are doing anything all that great within the tentpole movie arena, certainly nothing that approaches my favorites like Speed, Face Off, Mission Impossible Fallout etc. Marvel has their formula, I just happen to find it really fucking boring most of the time.

As I've said, I'm happy for Marvel movies to exist. People like them, they make money, they keep theaters afloat at the moment... no problem. I don't need to watch them. What annoys me are those fans who ONLY care about big tentpoles and (a) cheer the idea of theaters being the sole reserve of mindless action/fantasy and want everything else to be relegated to streaming and/or (b) get personally insulted if you dare dislike one of those tentpole products as if criticism is either an attack on them or an indication of being a killjoy.

My most unpopular (read: snobby) opinion is that it is very sad for any 30/40/50 year old to call themselves a movie fan and only watch big blockbusters (teenagers get a pass of course, because, well they are teenagers. For many, movies are just something to do with friends rather than an actually hobby or something). Movie studies catering for teenage tastes makes sense, but to me the problem is the number of grown ass adults who claim to be movie fans that have not evolved past teenage tastes who are actively dismissive of anything that is not "fun" and "entertaining". (Note: this does not include grown-ass adults who don't really care about movies in general and will just watch whatever is on or reaches critical mass. They have always existed and aren't the problem)

[Skitch]

With all the qualifications described, I think we all on same page, trans. Hell, Duke and I are probably about the most guilty of nearing such descriptions, but I still feel we both as likely to watch latest comic book movie as we are any foreign independent flick (maybe I shouldn't speak for him). Sure we probably don't seek out some as much as baby doll, but I don't feel anyone on MC in particular falls into the full mainstream crowd.

[transmogrifier]

With all the qualifications described, I think we all on same page, trans. Hell, Duke and I are probably about the most guilty of nearing such descriptions, but I still feel we both as likely to watch latest comic book movie as we are any foreign independent flick (maybe I shouldn't speak for him). Sure we probably don't seek out some as much as baby doll, but I don't feel anyone on MC in particular falls into the full mainstream crowd.

Nah, I wouldn't put either of you anywhere near that description. Liking comic book movies does not invalidate any self-professed "movie fan" status at all; hell, just liking ONLY comic book movies on its own is not a problem (why would it be? Like what you like), as long as you don't actively denigrate those who like more... diverse movie choices and you aren't excited by the prospect of theaters ONLY showing what you like. Over at reddit on the box office subreddit, it is dispiriting to see all the self-professed movie fans cheering on Marvel's bottom line while sneering at other movies underperforming with "well, they should have gone to streaming" or "maybe they should have made something people want to watch". We slowly seem to be training a generation who not only want to watch ONLY big blockbusters (as I said, not necessarily a problem) but who are actively dismissive of anything else (this is bad).

To add as an illustration: When The Last Duel flopped, there were a large number of comments along the lines of "I didn't want to go to the theater to watch someone get raped. When I go to the theater, I want to be entertained!" - there just seems to be fewer and fewer people interested in being challenged by a film, and who think theater showings should exclusively be theme park rides.

[Skitch]

Nah, I wouldn't put either of you anywhere near that description. Liking comic book movies does not invalidate any self-professed "movie fan" status at all; hell, just liking ONLY comic book movies on its own is not a problem (why would it be? Like what you like), as long as you don't actively denigrate those who like more... diverse movie choices and you aren't excited by the prospect of theaters ONLY showing what you like. Over at reddit on the box office subreddit, it is dispiriting to see all the self-professed movie fans cheering on Marvel's bottom line while sneering at other movies underperforming with "well, they should have gone to streaming" or "maybe they should have made something people want to watch". We slowly seem to be training a generation who not only want to watch ONLY big blockbusters (as I said, not necessarily a problem) but who are actively dismissive of anything else (this is bad).

To add as an illustration: When The Last Duel flopped, there were a large number of comments along the lines of "I didn't want to go to the theater to watch someone get raped. When I go to the theater, I want to be entertained!" - there just seems to be fewer and fewer people interested in being challenged by a film, and who think theater showings should exclusively be theme park rides.

This continues to encourage me to avoid reddit lol

[transmogrifier]

This continues to encourage me to avoid reddit lol

I like reddit because you can choose the subreddits you want. It is useless for discussing movies though because any opinion that goes against the prevailing acceptable beliefs is downvoted and buried, perpetuating the hivemind.

[megladon8]

Watch what you like and let others do the same.

[DFA1979]

Reddit is awful and should be destroyed.

[megladon8]

Joker was fine.

Phoenix's performance is awe-inspiring. Incredible stuff.

The movie surrounding it...not so much. It's fine. Gets frighteningly close to romanticizing mental illness, and oversimplifies some very complex discussions on the subject.

Phoenix deserved the Oscar, though.

[Idioteque Stalker]

I have now seen every Ghibli movie at least once. 100% legendary studio. Incredible output. Even the movies near the bottom of my list have plenty of redeeming qualities (save for the putrid Earwig). The way things have trended for the past decade makes me hope How Do You Live is the studio's final film. The last one I checked off the list, From Up on Poppy Hill, was very emotional, a redemption for Goro in my eyes. No surprise dad helped with the script.

1. The Tale of Princess Kaguya *****
2. My Neighbor Totoro *****
3. Only Yesterday ****
4. Spirited Away ****
5. My Neighbors the Yamadas ****

6. Princess Mononoke ****
7. Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind ****
8. From Up on Poppy Hill ***
9. The Wind Rises ***
10. Whisper of the Heart ***

11. The Cat Returns ***
12. Castle In the Sky ***
13. Grave of the Fireflies ***
14. Howl's Moving Castle ***
15. Porco Rosso ***

16. Kiki's Delivery Service ***
17. Ponyo ***
18. Ocean Waves ***
19. Arrietty **
20. Pom Poko **

21. Tales from Earthsea **
22. When Marnie Was There **
23. Earwig and the Witch *

[StanleyK]

Despite the annoying gimmick, Searching is a kind of decent film, up until the ridiculous twist ending. Just once, I'd like to see...

a movie about a disappeared girl where in the end it turns out that she actually is dead. No matter how implausible their survival, little girls in Hollywood movies are impervious to death.

Sadly the catch is if someone recommends a movie like that, it's a dead giveaway of the ending. Oh well.

[StanleyK]

I have now seen every Ghibli movie at least once. 100% legendary studio. Incredible output. Even the movies near the bottom of my list have plenty of redeeming qualities (save for the putrid Earwig). The way things have trended for the past decade makes me hope How Do You Live is the studio's final film. The last one I checked off the list, From Up on Poppy Hill, was very emotional, a redemption for Goro in my eyes. No surprise dad helped with the script.


You've got Kiki's Delivery Service awfully low on that list.




Joker was fine.

Phoenix's performance is awe-inspiring. Incredible stuff.

The movie surrounding it...not so much. It's fine. Gets frighteningly close to romanticizing mental illness, and oversimplifies some very complex discussions on the subject.

Phoenix deserved the Oscar, though.

It was basically a watered down version of Taxi Driver and The King of Comedy.

I don't even think Phoenix was that good. No actor has topped Nicholson's turn as the Joker imo.

[StuSmallz]

It was basically a watered down version of Taxi Driver and The King of Comedy.

I don't even think Phoenix was that good. No actor has topped Nicholson's turn as the Joker imo.I don't think so; Nicholson essentially sleep-walked his way through that role, and he was far more "Joker-ish" in something like The Shining. As far as oncreen takes on Bat baddies go, Ledger's Joker and Pfeiffer's Catwoman were both far superior:


https://youtu.be/P_yN85I4YOY

[Philip J. Fry]

I have now seen every Ghibli movie at least once. 100% legendary studio. Incredible output. Even the movies near the bottom of my list have plenty of redeeming qualities (save for the putrid Earwig). The way things have trended for the past decade makes me hope How Do You Live is the studio's final film. The last one I checked off the list, From Up on Poppy Hill, was very emotional, a redemption for Goro in my eyes. No surprise dad helped with the script.

1. The Tale of Princess Kaguya *****
2. My Neighbor Totoro *****
3. Only Yesterday ****
4. Spirited Away ****
5. My Neighbors the Yamadas ****

6. Princess Mononoke ****
7. Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind ****
8. From Up on Poppy Hill ***
9. The Wind Rises ***
10. Whisper of the Heart ***

11. The Cat Returns ***
12. Castle In the Sky ***
13. Grave of the Fireflies ***
14. Howl's Moving Castle ***
15. Porco Rosso ***

16. Kiki's Delivery Service ***
17. Ponyo ***
18. Ocean Waves ***
19. Arrietty **
20. Pom Poko **

21. Tales from Earthsea **
22. When Marnie Was There **
23. Earwig and the Witch *
Have ye watched Castle of Cagliostro and Gauche the Cellist? Although they're not Ghibli per se, they were made by Miyazaki and Takahata and are very good.

Also, The Red Turtle is technically a Ghibli too.:D

[Philip J. Fry]

My list, BTW:

26. Earwig and the Witch
25. Tales from Earthsea
24. The Cat Returns
23. Ocean Waves
22. Pom Poko
21. Gauche the Cellist
20. Ponyo
19. My Neighbors the Yamadas
18. From Up on Poppy Hill
17. Arrietty
16. When Marnie Was There
15. Lupin III: Castle of Cagliostro
14. Howl's Moving Castle
13. The Wind Rises
12. Castle In the Sky
11. Only Yesterday
10. Porco Rosso
9. Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind
8. Grave of the Fireflies
7. My Neighbor Totoro
6. Kiki's Delivery Service
5. The Red Turtle
4. Whisper of the Heart
3. Spirited Away
2. The Tale of Princess Kaguya
1. Princess Mononoke

[Spun Lepton]

Scavenger Hunt from 1979 was a movie I A-FREAKING-DORED when I was a little kid. I swear, I watched it at least 2 dozen times when I was little. I remember thinking Richard Mulligan's slapstick was *chef's kiss*. This week I found it available on Kino Cult and nostalgia just exploded in my brain. (Not literally.) I had to make some popcorn and watch it immediately.

You might think this is the point where I talk about how it doesn't hold up ... but it does!! I mean, it's no GREAT movie, by any stretch. It feels a little overlong at 2 hours, but it's light and breezy with a lot of over-the-top performances. Richard Mulligan still shines. His expressions and mannerisms reminiscent of the old silent-era slapstick movies. As a kid I didn't appreciate the cast, but holy cow, what a line-up. Richard Benjamin, Cloris Leachman, Roddy McDowell, Richard Masur, Tony Randall, Cleavon Little, James Coco, Robert Morley, and cameos by Vincent Price, Ruth Gordon, Stephen Furst, Scatman Crothers, Meat Loaf, and freaking Arnold Schwarzenegger.

7/10

I plan to seek out its spiritual companion, Midnight Madness, another movie about a scavenger hunt that came out right around the same time. Only thing I remember from that one is a very young Michael J. Fox is in it.

[Philip J. Fry]

1470915467220905986

[Spun Lepton]

I watched Midnight Madness. I may go into more detail later, but ... a generous 3/10. Just painful.

[Spun Lepton]

Imagine a couple of the writers for the utterly unwatchable sitcom 2 Broke Girls decided to write a caper comedy for kids. But, in order to appeal to the adults in the audience, they also decided to add in weirdly inappropriate sexual humor. I think this is the best description for Midnight Madness. All of the characters are drawn in the broadest strokes possible. These aren't just exaggerated performances, these are living caricatures. There are a couple of those in the comparable Scavenger Hunt, but in Midnight Madness, everybody outside of the five leads at the film's core are living cartoons. Stephen Furst's entire team are so exaggerated that they quickly become irritating. Stephen Furst himself plays a cartoonishly evil "fat buffoon," whose desire to eat all the time leads to his team's loss. His team is literally made up of: his constantly nagging girlfriend, a friend who smirks and revels in every one of Furst's failures, an idiot nicknamed Barf who spends 90% of the movie looking slack-jawed and laughing like Butthead, and Blade, a mute Hispanic man who always has a switchblade out. The other teams in the movie don't fare any better. Eddie Deezen does his usual nerd thing and actually gets the only legitimate laugh in the entire movie -- a moment where his character gets hit in the face with a tomato. I assure you, the gag works only because of his reaction and timing and not because of the writing in the scene. It's also early enough in the movie to give you some false hope that the rest of this trainwreck might be enjoyable.

Every line of dialogue feels like a reject from a Full House episode. There's an attempt as a human story here, too, with David Naughton's character making a familial connection with his younger brother, played by a very young Michael J. Fox. Naughton also has a love interest that "develops" throughout the movie. But both of these side-plots feel very unearned in the end. Both of them rely on the characters having convenient epiphanies rather than gradually learning throughout the story. Naughton coming around to love his brother is literally a scene where he drives away and leaves the movie for a minute or two, and then returns after having complete 180-degree change of heart off-screen. Guh.

But, I think the worst part about it is just how irritating every single character in the movie is. Characters who are supposed to be likeable are utterly punchable. I hated all of them. I wanted everybody to lose. I kept hoping they would suddenly find themselves in the movie Miracle Mile, with atomic blasts going off all around L.A., but alas, it was not meant to be.

2/10


I'm done being generous to this garbage heap.

**Edit 360-degree to 180-degree

[Idioteque Stalker]

You've got Kiki's Delivery Service awfully low on that list.

I like Kiki very much overall, but two pretty insignificant things really bother me for some reason. First, it's annoying to me how rude she is for no reason to that one really nice kid. Second, she's super reckless around streets/traffic. It's one of a few I've only seen once -- maybe it'll move up the list one day.



Have ye watched Castle of Cagliostro and Gauche the Cellist? Although they're not Ghibli per se, they were made by Miyazaki and Takahata and are very good.

Also, The Red Turtle is technically a Ghibli too.:D

I have seen and liked Cagliostro, but haven't gotten my hands on Gauche. I didn't count them (or Horus: Prince of the Sun, which I love) because they were released before Ghibli was founded, but then again that is also true of Nausicaa...

And The Red Turtle is a good movie that doesn't feel like a proper Ghibli release to me, probably because it's not anime. It'd be somewhere right smack dab in the middle of my list, right around Grave of the Fireflies.

Love seeing Kaguya so high on your list. Hate seeing The Cat Returns so low. You must hate cats!

[Philip J. Fry]

I have seen and liked Cagliostro, but haven't gotten my hands on Gauche. I didn't count them (or Horus: Prince of the Sun, which I love) because they were released before Ghibli was founded, but then again that is also true of Nausicaa...

And The Red Turtle is a good movie that doesn't feel like a proper Ghibli release to me, probably because it's not anime. It'd be somewhere right smack dab in the middle of my list, right around Grave of the Fireflies.

Love seeing Kaguya so high on your list. Hate seeing The Cat Returns so low. You must hate cats!Nah, I love cats. I just find Cat Returns kinda dull, at least for Ghibli standards, and kinda forgettable. It just doesn't feel like it has that richness in characterization of other films. It's not a bad movie and I don't really dislike it. It's just that Ghibli's standards are pretty high.

Also, It's the first time I've heard of Horus: Prince of the Sun, so I'll look out for it.

[StuSmallz]

The best films of Sundance 2022: our favorites of the fest include Happening, After Yang, and Emily The Criminal (https://www.avclub.com/the-best-films-of-sundance-2022-1848444408)

[megladon8]

Watched my first Taylor Sheridan film last night with Wind River, and it was phenomenal.

Everyone is fantastic in it, beautiful dialogue, and a conclusion that is equal parts heart wrenching and hopeful.

Still digesting it, but initial feelings and enthusiasm have me wanting to rank it with some of the GOAT's of its type (Memories of Murder, Gone Baby Gone, etc.)

"She ran six miles in the snow."

[Philip J. Fry]

Watched my first Taylor Sheridan film last night with Wind River, and it was phenomenal.

Everyone is fantastic in it, beautiful dialogue, and a conclusion that is equal parts heart wrenching and hopeful.

Still digesting it, but initial feelings and enthusiasm have me wanting to rank it with some of the GOAT's of its type (Memories of Murder, Gone Baby Gone, etc.)

"She ran six miles in the snow."I recently watched an Aussie film of that type starring Eric Bana. It's called The Dry. You should give it a shot. It's pretty good.

[megladon8]

Very cool, I will check it out. Thank you!

I always liked Eric Bana. Wish he had a stronger career.

[Philip J. Fry]

Very cool, I will check it out. Thank you!

I always liked Eric Bana. Wish he had a stronger career.Same.

[Skitch]

Same. Hes underrated imo.

[megladon8]

Chopper is worth seeing just for his performance.

[DFA1979]

Chopper is worth seeing just for his performance.

Good flick.

Wind River is excellent, also. I saw that in theaters.

[StuSmallz]

Wind River is excellent, also. I saw that in theaters.I liked it too, which is why I'm going to repost my old review of it in here now:



https://i.ibb.co/g9nCjsZ/Wind-River-2017.jpg (https://ibb.co/6wd5n60)



In Wind River, the tracks of predators and prey, both animal and human alike, constantly dot the endless, perpetually snowy landscape, inevitably leading to traumas that, while they may be past, are anything but forgotten. The "River" in question is a Native American reservation in Wyoming, where, somewhere in this desolate, lifeless landscape the size of Rhode Island, an 18 year-old Native American girl is found brutally raped, her body frozen to the ground so solid that a chainsaw has to clear her from the unforgiving frost. A young agent from the FBI gets called in, a local Wildlife Service agent gets involved, and together, the two of them must find out what happened to the girl on that bitterly cold, horrible night. If all of that sounds like setup for a rather familiar detective thriller, that's because it is; Wind River doesn't break any new (frozen) ground when it comes to its particular genre, but then again, it doesn't pretend to.

Rather, first-time director (but veteran screenwriter) Taylor Sheridan takes the suspenseful style he honed on the American frontiers of West Texas and the Mexican border in Hell Or High Water & Sicario, and applies it to the forgotten, neglected wasteland of Wind River, a place that's depressed in both the economic and spiritual sense of the word, where poverty is everywhere, drug addiction runs rampant, and, due to the bureaucratic nightmares that intersect between tribal, local, and Federal authorities when it comes to jurisdiction over crimes on reservations, many serious offences (including murders) are often never punished, or even solved.


Into this daunting situation steps Elizabeth Olsen's determined, but out-of-her-element FBI rookie Jane Banner, joined by Jeremy Renner's grieving, divorced, world-weary Wildlife agent Cory Lambert, a man who has a rather personal connection to this particular case, as, not only was he the one who discovered the young woman's body, but the girl in question used to be close friends with his daughter, who herself was murdered under similar, unsolved circumstances a couple of years ago, a loss that Lambert admits he still hasn't recovered from, nor ever will. But, like I said before, pretty much none of the base material here is particularly original, it's the personal touch in Sheridan's direction that makes all the difference, as he never hesitates from taking the time to slow down the pace drastically, and just let us get to know the characters ourselves through quiet scenes of his insightful, sharply-written dialogue, balancing the character to character heart-to-hearts inbetween the film's more visceral, intense thrills.


And, while the central mystery isn't much of a, well, mystery, as, except for an unexpected flashback that takes place late in the third act, the plot proceeds in a rather simple, straightforward manner, with next to no red herrings or "persons of interest" to speak of, it isn't the suspense of where the investigation may lead that makes Wind River so good, nor is it the thrills of its various armed standoffs/shootouts (although those are quite good in their own right), but it's the touches of personal, human drama that happen along the way, the way that Sheridan genuinely cares for his characters here, and the way that they're treated as much more than just hollow puppets to move the story along, that makes River as powerful, as memorable a cinematic experience as it is. Long after you leave the comfort of your air-conditioned theater, the physical & emotional atmosphere of the vast, frozen landscape presented here will chill your bones, the tracks dotting it leaving visible marks as undeniable as the spiritual ones staining the souls of the people who live there.

Final Score: 8.5

[Skitch]

I thought that was a very decent flick. Very.

[Philip J. Fry]

I thought that was a very decent flick. Very.Yeah. Very much so.

[transmogrifier]

How the fuck have I managed to watch four Shawn Levy movies in my life? One is an understandable mistake, two is careless, three is irresponsible... but FOUR?

[Philip J. Fry]

How the fuck have I managed to watch four Shawn Levy movies in my life? One is an understandable mistake, two is careless, three is irresponsible... but FOUR?Some folks were just born to suffer.

[StuSmallz]

Some folks were just born to suffer.
https://i.ibb.co/Ttqw76C/giphy.gif (https://imgbb.com/)

[transmogrifier]

Some folks were just born to suffer.

Here I am asserting my independence and standing up to the Marvel machine by not bothering to keep up with them, and I've seen FOUR Shawn Levy movies? Talk about a splash of cold water on the face.

(in case anyone was wondering, I was updating my Excel viewing log and came to Free Guy.... and then it dawned on me. I don't even think I knew going in who directed it.)

[Skitch]

*looks over imdb

The only thing I've seen directed by him is Stranger Things. Fuck is wrong with you, trans, gross :D :D

[Philip J. Fry]

1489460135089307648
Damn.

[Yxklyx]

"No movie featuring either Harry Dean Stanton or M. Emmet Walsh in a supporting role can be altogether bad." - Roger Ebert

What if the movie features both?

Straight Time is alright - it's not bad. Worth a look. Saw this on Amazon Prime (for a slight additional cost) and the picture looked awesome, like it was filmed last year.

Starring Dustin Hoffman and it appears he co-directed.

[baby doll]

Some folks were just born to suffer."Every Night & every Morn
Some to Misery are Born
Every Morn and every Night
Some are Born to sweet delight
Some are Born to sweet delight
Some are Born to Endless Night"

Now be sensible and go watch Dead Man. Or Endless Night, or something else not mediocre.

[megladon8]

Every couple of years Jen and I do a year of what we call "Picks" in an effort to not just endlessly rewatch the same favorites. Twice a week one of us picks a movie that the other cannot dispute.

Tonight Jen picked The Trouble With Harry, a Hitchcock film neither of us had seen before.

We both went into it pretty much blind, and enjoyed it a lot. A sharp black comedy that feels like it must have been an influence on the Coen's and others like them.

Stumbles once or twice with gags that overstay their welcome. And the amount of time that passes over the course of the story doesn't make sense at all.

It's not quite top level Hitchcock, but not one of his weaker efforts.

[Grouchy]

Love that movie, that's cool that you discovered it. Shirley MacLaine is tops.

[DFA1979]

I really like that one meg but yeah Hitchcock did better. Still it's one of my favorites from him because it's a wonderfully simple dark comedy set in the fall in the countryside. Also yes as Grouchy points out MacLaine rocks.

[StuSmallz]

When Max Met Furiosa: The years-long process of casting Fury Road involved dozens of future stars — and just as many what-ifs (https://www.vulture.com/article/oral-history-casting-mad-max-fury-road-tom-hardy-charlize-theron.html)

[megladon8]

I remembered 2010 being a lot better.

[StuSmallz]

I remembered 2010 being a lot better.You mean as far as the movies that came out go?

[megladon8]

You mean as far as the movies that came out go?

No, 2010: The Year We Make Contact

Sequel to 2001.

[DFA1979]

I liked 2010 but the book works better. Still a pretty solid sequel to 2001.

[Skitch]

Wow, timing....I've been reading 2061: Odyssey 3 for last week or so....

[Morris Schæffer]

When Max Met Furiosa: The years-long process of casting Fury Road involved dozens of future stars — and just as many what-ifs (https://www.vulture.com/article/oral-history-casting-mad-max-fury-road-tom-hardy-charlize-theron.html)

Could be a cool book to read. Thanks for the link.

[megladon8]

Last night it was my turn to pick a movie, and I couldn't decide between The Third Man and Gangster No. 1, and neither of us have seen either of them. So I gave Jen the final decision, and she chose Gangster No. 1.

It took about 40 minutes for me to get on track with the movie, but I ended up really liking it. Has some interesting stylistic choices with the camera and editing, and is a decent character study of an empty monster of a human.

It's like American Psycho for the British gangster genre.

[Grouchy]

Ok I have to see that, but make sure you check out The Third Man next movie night.

[StuSmallz]

Ok I have to see that, but make sure you check out The Third Man next movie night.Seconded!

[Skitch]

Third-degree! Great flick

[Yxklyx]

Ok I have to see that, but make sure you check out The Third Man next movie night.

Yeah, that's one of those obscure hidden gems.

[Grouchy]

Yeah, that's one of those obscure hidden gems.
Can't tell if you're being sarcastic hahah

[Wryan]

Lamb was weird, sure, but I was expecting the kind of weird more up my alley. Still good, tho slow and deliberate. Acting was great; maybe 15 pages of dialogue in the whole movie. Kid was cute. Probably my fault for expecting more of an artsy creature feature. Handily the best fucking "animal acting" I've ever seen, best since the dog from The Thing.

[DFA1979]

The Third Man is currently my favorite movie of all time. I made a list on Twitter a year ago I think.

[StuSmallz]

The Third Man is currently my favorite movie of all time. I made a list on Twitter a year ago I think.Do you still have it around, just out of curiosity?

[Yxklyx]

Has anyone watched films on Vimeo? I want to watch The Wind (1928) and I found it there (https://vimeo.com/122341653) but I don't have a Vimeo account. Will I be able to watch the entire film there or will it cut out because I don't have an account? Or is there a better site to watch this film?

[Grouchy]

It's also here - https://texasarchive.org/2015_01107

[DFA1979]

Do you still have it around, just out of curiosity?

No but I could probably recreate it seeing as I made it off the top of my head.

[megladon8]

The Little Girl Who Lives Down the Lane is nearly 50 years old, but still shocking and uncomfortable.

A great script and fine performances all around, but pedestrian direction that had me wondering if it was made for TV. Very boring visually.

Martin Sheen plays one of the most disgusting, deplorable characters I've seen in a film in some time. And the script and concept makes good use of Jodie Foster's unusual maturity.

However in a film about the revolting sexualization of a 13 year old girl, it makes a really strange decision in having her engage in male-gazey on-screen disrobing. That felt very icky.

Good movie, though. Glad I saw it. As I said at the start, it's still shocking today.

[Yxklyx]

The Little Girl Who Lives Down the Lane is nearly 50 years old, but still shocking and uncomfortable.

A great script and fine performances all around, but pedestrian direction that had me wondering if it was made for TV. Very boring visually.

Martin Sheen plays one of the most disgusting, deplorable characters I've seen in a film in some time. And the script and concept makes good use of Jodie Foster's unusual maturity.

However in a film about the revolting sexualization of a 13 year old girl, it makes a really strange decision in having her engage in male-gazey on-screen disrobing. That felt very icky.

Good movie, though. Glad I saw it. As I said at the start, it's still shocking today.

Alright - I couldn't get past the first 10 minutes so I'll give it another shot.

[StuSmallz]

No but I could probably recreate it seeing as I made it off the top of my head.
https://i.ibb.co/WgVJQMc/giphy.gif (https://imgbb.com/)

[megladon8]

Alright - I couldn't get past the first 10 minutes so I'll give it another shot.

It's worth a watch for sure, especially with it being so short.

[megladon8]

What we've watched the last couple of nights...

Star Trek: The Motion Picture
This is really good and I don't get why it is so polarizing. It feels as truly Star Trek as you can get - hard sci fi with big ideas. It wears its inspirations on its sleeve (2001, Forbidden Planet), and does cool new things with effects and visuals. And man, that musical score is legendary. Incredible stuff.

Baby Driver
Good movie that is ruined by the presence of two serial sex offenders in lead roles. And Elgort isn't even very good.
But it has some great humour, astounding action, and Wright has a lot of fun with the camera as he always does.
Just wish it had different casting.

[Skitch]

Star Trek: TMP is the best Star Trek film.

[StuSmallz]

What we've watched the last couple of nights...

Star Trek: The Motion Picture
This is really good and I don't get why it is so polarizing. It feels as truly Star Trek as you can get - hard sci fi with big ideas. It wears its inspirations on its sleeve (2001, Forbidden Planet), and does cool new things with effects and visuals. And man, that musical score is legendary. Incredible stuff.Sorry; I'm something of a Trekkie, but I still felt TMP was a pretty dull first movie for the series, since it kind of feels to me the way I imagine the people who think 2001 is boring feel about that, you know?

[megladon8]

I get it, I just don't agree. I don't find it boring at all.

Same with 2001. When someone says they think 2001 is boring, I expect their top 10 favorite movies to include a lot of stuff by Michael Bay and McG.

[StuSmallz]

I get it, I just don't agree. I don't find it boring at all.

Same with 2001. When someone says they think 2001 is boring, I expect their top 10 favorite movies to include a lot of stuff by Michael Bay and McG.Eh, for me Undiscovered Country has always been the best Trek (out of the ones I've seen, at least), since it did the best job of balancing the underlying optimism of Rodenberry's vision with the more popcorn-y thrills needed to entertain the non-Trekkies out there.

[StuSmallz]

https://i.ibb.co/YXjv4m7/the-return-of-the-king-for-frodo.jpg (https://imgbb.com/)

For Frodo.

Why is it so hard for movie trilogies to come to a strong end? Sure, there are trilogies that START strong, and even continue that way for a while, like in the cases of The Godfather, The Dark Knight, and the original Star Wars trilogies, but even the best of these still always seem to pewter out to a certain extent by their third entry, having already exhausted their best material beforehand... all of them, that is, except for one. Yes, in case you somehow hadn't figured it out by now, that one trilogy is Peter Jackson's Lord Of The Rings, and that expectation-shattering third entry is The Return Of The King, a fantastic conclusion to what has become one of film's definitive series, and a modern, generation-defining classic in its own right.

After beginning with the disturbing tale of Gollum's origins (in a sequence that was wisely moved from The Two Towers (https://letterboxd.com/stusmallz/film/the-lord-of-the-rings-the-two-towers/)to here), King picks up right where the previous film left off, with the kingdom of Rohan having defeated Saruman's forces, Merry & Pippin reuniting with the rest of the fellowship, and Sam, Frodo, and a seemingly helpful Gollum making for an uneasy alliance, as the trio trudge ever closer to the dark land of Mordor, where the War Of The Ring, and the fate of Middle Earth itself, will be decided once and for all.

So, just like the way that Towers upped its scale from the comparatively "small" Fellowship, King continues in the same direction, with the scope of its story becoming just about as epic as epic gets, but not in a numbing, overwhelming manner, but in a way that fully showcases the power of a visual medium like film, as Jackson and company bring Tolkien's words to awe-inspiring life, with Howard Shore's sweeping score, the lavish, lovingly detailed sets, and endless fields of the forces of good and evil stretching out as far as the eye of Sauron can see, as they fight back-and-forth for the fate of an entire planet in some of the most gargantuan battle scenes ever filmed.

Of course, the scale of such a story wouldn't matter at all if we didn't care about the individuals caught up in it, but Jackson never loses sight of the characters within the struggle, superbly balancing the epic with the intimate, as he's not afraid to slow down and focus on relatable human struggles, whether it be the tragic sub-plot of Faramir and his distant father Denethor, King Theoden's elevation of Eowyn to be the future ruler of their kingdom (as a sort of way to make up for the death of his son in the previous film), or the final steps of Sam & Frodo's arduous journey, which sees them reach the darkest of places, both in a physical sense, as well as a spiritual one, as the corruption of the One Ring threatens to be finally be too much for Frodo to bear anymore.

But, good does ultimately triumph here, and while the seemingly endless "false endings" of King have become a bit of a running joke since its release, I feel that they're well-earned here, since they give the sense of events having come around full circle for the fellowship, as the hobbits finally reach the end of their long journey where they started, back in the warm sunshine of the Shire, enjoying a much-deserved rest, just like Return Of The King enjoyed a much-deserved torrent of awards and praise, as it eternally secured the cinematic legacy of Lord Of The Rings, once, and for all. One ring to bind them, and one trilogy to rule them all, baby!

Final Score: 9

​Sorry, baby doll!

[DFA1979]

I'm too lazy to look for the thread or whatever but The King's Man was a mess and definitely is (so far) the worst movie I've seen from 2021. That and Eternals which bored the ever living hell out of me for most of it's run time.

[Skitch]

Yeah the Eternals was a chore to get through. And at the end once all was revealed, I asked myself, "but do you care?"

No. The answer was no. I did not.

[StuSmallz]

Okay, I was too tough on Iron Man 3: Our chief film critic A.A. Dowd revisits the one C+ he's never lived down (https://www.avclub.com/iron-man-3-aa-dowd-1848583943)

[StuSmallz]

The Quiet Terror Of Alien: How sound (or lack of it) builds the Sci-Fi Horror film’s seminal scares (https://filmschoolrejects.com/alien/)

[megladon8]

Revisited Serpico last night.
Did Lumet ever do any films that had anything interesting going on visually or stylistically? I've seen several and they all seem based around dynamite scripts and performances, but with incredibly boring visual direction.

[Skitch]

Interesting question. Looking over his filmography, 1. I'm ashamed I havent seen more because Ive really liked everything I've seen, but 2. it seems like he has a talent/knack/choice of selecting work that is primarily set in singular locations? Maybe I'm wrong.

[megladon8]

Interesting question. Looking over his filmography, 1. I'm ashamed I havent seen more because Ive really liked everything I've seen, but 2. it seems like he has a talent/knack/choice of selecting work that is primarily set in singular locations? Maybe I'm wrong.

You may be right, Skitch. I think he did quite a bit of work with stage as well as adapting stage works to screen. So that would make sense.

His visual direction seems to be purely functional. Which is...fine. But not really what I personally go to movies for.

It reminds me of an interview I saw with Peter Bogdanovich on TCM, where he was discussing his favorite films. I forget the exact context of the comment, but at one point he said, "...and to this day, that's all that movies really are. Just people talking."

And I remember thinking, "gotta disagree with you there, bud."

The idea of reducing such an incredible visual medium like film down to "it's just people talking" has always felt asinine to me.

Anyways, my point being, I wonder if Lumet came from a similar school of thought.

[Skitch]

I can't disagree with your opinion...but I am fascinated by movies that are originated by plays. Noises Off! is brilliant

[megladon8]

I can't disagree with your opinion...but I am fascinated by movies that are originated by plays. Noises Off! is brilliant

I agree 100% and I love them, too.

I'm just saying to reduce the entire art form and medium down to "it's people talking" doesn't make sense to me.

[megladon8]

Sam Elliot sure has some feelings about Power of the Dog. (https://variety.com/2022/film/news/sam-elliot-slams-the-power-of-the-dog-homosexuality-1235192840/)

Yeeeesh.

Not a good look.

[baby doll]

You may be right, Skitch. I think he did quite a bit of work with stage as well as adapting stage works to screen. So that would make sense.

His visual direction seems to be purely functional. Which is...fine. But not really what I personally go to movies for.

It reminds me of an interview I saw with Peter Bogdanovich on TCM, where he was discussing his favorite films. I forget the exact context of the comment, but at one point he said, "...and to this day, that's all that movies really are. Just people talking."

And I remember thinking, "gotta disagree with you there, bud."

The idea of reducing such an incredible visual medium like film down to "it's just people talking" has always felt asinine to me.

Anyways, my point being, I wonder if Lumet came from a similar school of thought.Films of people talking aren't inherently less "cinematic" than films consisting mainly of physical action; there are lots of ways to film people talking, some more dynamic than others. His Girl Friday is one of the talkiest films ever made but Hawks keeps his actors in constant motion, whereas contemporary action movies--e.g., any film by Peter Jackson or Christopher Nolan--tend toward visual monotony: static scenes of expository dialogue punctuated by illegible action scenes. Bodganovich's films seem to me more impressive visually than Lumet's, as the former was trying to revive a classical tradition that Lumet--especially in his earlier, more visually emphatic films, such as The Pawnbroker--helped to kill off before calming down somewhat in his later films, but both are largely at the mercy of their scripts. My favourite Bodganovich films are currently The Last Picture Show, Saint Jack, and The Cat's Meow; my favourite Lumets are Dog Day Afternoon, Find Me Guilty, and Before the Devil Knows You're Dead, but there's still a lot I haven't seen by both directors.

[DFA1979]

Yeah the Eternals was a chore to get through. And at the end once all was revealed, I asked myself, "but do you care?"

No. The answer was no. I did not.

It is literally what people accuse MCU films of all being haha. I now know how they feel. Plus contrasting it with Shang Chai which is just tons of fun.

[megladon8]

Films of people talking aren't inherently less "cinematic" than films consisting mainly of physical action; there are lots of ways to film people talking, some more dynamic than others. His Girl Friday is one of the talkiest films ever made but Hawks keeps his actors in constant motion, whereas contemporary action movies--e.g., any film by Peter Jackson or Christopher Nolan--tend toward visual monotony: static scenes of expository dialogue punctuated by illegible action scenes. Bodganovich's films seem to me more impressive visually than Lumet's, as the former was trying to revive a classical tradition that Lumet--especially in his earlier, more visually emphatic films, such as The Pawnbroker--helped to kill off before calming down somewhat in his later films, but both are largely at the mercy of their scripts. My favourite Bodganovich films are currently The Last Picture Show, Saint Jack, and The Cat's Meow; my favourite Lumets are Dog Day Afternoon, Find Me Guilty, and Before the Devil Knows You're Dead, but there's still a lot I haven't seen by both directors.


It's not physical action I'm talking about, though. Lumet doesn't do anything interesting with the camera. Close and medium shots, stock angles, no real visual style.

His films are vehicles for the scripts and performances with zero flare.

[baby doll]

It's not physical action I'm talking about, though. Lumet doesn't do anything interesting with the camera. Close and medium shots, stock angles, no real visual style.

His films are vehicles for the scripts and performances with zero flare.Considering how overbearing Lumet's style in his early films, it's probably for the best he toned it down in his later work, where (notwithstanding the flashy transitions in Before the Devil Knows You're Dead, to cite only the first example that comes to mind) he seems to concentrate his creative efforts more on the films' mise en scène than the camera: e.g., the highly purposeful colour-coding in Before the Devil Knows You're Dead. I wouldn't make any great claims for Lumet as a director, but his stylistic choices strike me as far more thought out and purposeful than most of the Hollywood directors who've followed in his wake. Incidentally his book Making Movies is very much worth a read.

[DFA1979]

I've liked all of what I've seem from Lumet so far. Some of his movies are dialogue driven which is fine with me. Dog Day Afternoon is probably one of the best bank heist hostage flicks I've ever seen and I love 12 Angry Men.

[Skitch]

It is literally what people accuse MCU films of all being haha. I now know how they feel. Plus contrasting it with Shang Chai which is just tons of fun.

Yeah I had fun with Shang Chai! And I knew nothing about either that or Eternals going in.

[Skitch]

I hate when I'm scrolling around and 12 Angry Men is on because whether theres 90 minutes left or 10, I have to watch it. It's nearly a rain man situation. Wonper! Wopner!

[megladon8]

Yeah Skitch can never say no to 12 Angry Men.

[megladon8]

Lol pwned

[StuSmallz]

Revisited Serpico last night.
Did Lumet ever do any films that had anything interesting going on visually or stylistically? I've seen several and they all seem based around dynamite scripts and performances, but with incredibly boring visual direction.What about 12 Angry Men, where, according to this... (https://web.archive.org/web/20090106012115/http://www.playhousesquare.org/bbuzz/12angrymen/d-evolution.html)


At the beginning of the film, the cameras are positioned above eye level and mounted with wide-angle lenses, to give the appearance of greater depth between subjects, but as the film progresses the focal length of the lenses is gradually increased. By the end of the film, nearly everyone is shown in closeup, using telephoto lenses from a lower angle, which decreases or "shortens" depth of field. Lumet stated that his intention in using these techniques with cinematographer Boris Kaufman was to create a nearly palpable claustrophobia.

[Skitch]

Lol pwned

LOL you're just mad you were #13

[StuSmallz]

Films of people talking aren't inherently less "cinematic" than films consisting mainly of physical action; there are lots of ways to film people talking, some more dynamic than others. His Girl Friday is one of the talkiest films ever made but Hawks keeps his actors in constant motionYou mean like exactly what Jackson had the actors do in Return Of The King (https://letterboxd.com/film/the-lord-of-the-rings-the-return-of-the-king/) when Gandalf was taking Pippin away, or when Aragon, Legolas, and Gimli were travelling to The Paths Of The Dead, or in the "bring wood & oil" scene with Denethor...?

https://i.ibb.co/P9g6C3h/giphy-downsized-large.gif (https://imgbb.com/)

[baby doll]

You mean like exactly what Jackson had the actors do in Return Of The King (https://letterboxd.com/film/the-lord-of-the-rings-the-return-of-the-king/) when Gandalf was taking Pippin away, or when Aragon, Legolas, and Gimli were travelling to The Paths Of The Dead, or in the "bring wood & oil" scene Not having seen any of The Lord of the Rings films since 2003, I don't remember the specific scenes you're referring to, but I still feel confident in asserting that Hawks mise en scène is more dynamic and purposeful than Jackson's, especially as the latter relies far more on cutting to guide the spectator's attention to relevant narrative information rather than staging.

[StuSmallz]

Mmmhmm. Anyway...
You may be right, Skitch. I think he did quite a bit of work with stage as well as adapting stage works to screen. So that would make sense.

His visual direction seems to be purely functional. Which is...fine. But not really what I personally go to movies for.

It reminds me of an interview I saw with Peter Bogdanovich on TCM, where he was discussing his favorite films. I forget the exact context of the comment, but at one point he said, "...and to this day, that's all that movies really are. Just people talking."

And I remember thinking, "gotta disagree with you there, bud."

The idea of reducing such an incredible visual medium like film down to "it's just people talking" has always felt asinine to me.

Anyways, my point being, I wonder if Lumet came from a similar school of thought....I suppose I do agree with you in general about Lumet, since I can't recall many moments in his movies that struck me as being particularly stylish, but that's never really been a problem, because I can't remember ever feeling that his movies needed any more style than they were given. Don't get me wrong, there are movies I've felt that way about before (like Hell Or High Water, for instance), but it's all on a case-by-case basis; for example, I didn't feel there was much of anything particularly "flashy" about the aesthetic of Chinatown (https://letterboxd.com/stusmallz/film/chinatown/), but it didn't hurt the movie at all, because the direction there mostly just needed to clearly convey Towne's writing, the rich period details, and the strength of the cast's performances, which it did very well, so that's all it needed to do to be a great movie.

[Skitch]

Well I'll be darned...as the last year or twos glut of "assassin girls kick everyones asses" have mostly sucked, The Protege (on Amazon Prime) was pretty good! Micheal Keaton does NOT mail shit in, its worth checking out just for him. Samuel L is excellent as always.

[megladon8]

The Muppet Movie was a freaking delight and I can't believe I haven't seen it before.

This will be very hard to beat this year, for first time viewings.

[Mysterious Dude]

Did Lumet ever do any films that had anything interesting going on visually or stylistically? I've seen several and they all seem based around dynamite scripts and performances, but with incredibly boring visual direction.

Fail-Safe is totally stylish.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bit3IiV0FRc

[megladon8]

Prisoners was really good. I need to make a point of seeing the rest of Villeneuve's stuff as I've yet to see a stinker from him.

[baby doll]

Prisoners was really good. I need to make a point of seeing the rest of Villeneuve's stuff as I've yet to see a stinker from him.Villeneuve, rated:

Un 32 août sur terre (1998) warm
Maelström (2000) warm
Polytechnique (2009) warm
Incendies (2010) mild
Enemy (2013) frozen
Arrival (2016) cold
Blade Runner 2049 (2017) cold

[Skitch]

Prisoners was really good. I need to make a point of seeing the rest of Villeneuve's stuff as I've yet to see a stinker from him.

He hasn't let me down yet. See everything.

[transmogrifier]

Incendies is his worst film by miles and just a cliched indie drama with an absolutely ridiculous ending. Skip that one.

[Skitch]

Incendies is his worst film by miles and just a cliched indie drama with an absolutely ridiculous ending. Skip that one.

Hmm...I dont think Ive seen that one. I've seen all his major projects (I mean like the ones with budgets and name actors), I haven't seen his earliest work stuff.

[megladon8]

I thought Blade Runner 2049 was fantastic.

[Skitch]

I thought Blade Runner 2049 was fantastic.

I didn't think I could think a sequel to BR could possibly work and I thought 2049 nailed it. Loved it. All the tones without repeating story, and I didnt figure it out until the end, which, is a rarity for me.

[megladon8]

What did you not like about Arrival, babydoll?

[baby doll]

What did you not like about Arrival, babydoll?I liked the beginning and end, but thought the middle dragged.

[StuSmallz]

The Arc Of Stanley Kubrick: From Killer’s Kiss to Eyes Wide Shut (https://musings.oscilloscope.net/post/160772353766/the-arc-of-stanley-kubrick-from-killers-kiss)

[megladon8]

Another first time viewing for me...

The Blues Brothers.

It was great.

[Skitch]

That's one of those movies where I'm like, "yeah but how many people died making this" lol

[baby doll]

That's one of those movies where I'm like, "yeah but how many people died making this" lolApparently fewer than Landis' segment for The Twilight Zone: The Movie, where he killed two Asian kids and Jennifer Jason Leigh's dad.

[Spun Lepton]

Another first time viewing for me...

The Blues Brothers.

It was great.

What's really? That's shocking to me. What other blind spots do you have? Here's one of my big ones:

I've never seen Apocalypse Now.

[Skitch]

What's really? That's shocking to me. What other blind spots do you have? Here's one of my big ones:

I've never seen Apocalypse Now.

Oh sir...

...imo the best movie based around the (horrific) Vietnam war.

[Philip J. Fry]

Oh sir...

...imo the best movie based around the (horrific) Vietnam war.Yup. It's, along The Deer Hunter, Platoon and Full Metal Jacket, one of the can't miss 'Nam flicks.

[Skitch]

Yup. It's, along The Deer Hunter, Platoon and Full Metal Jacket, one of the can't miss 'Nam flicks.

Yup. I have a harder time with Deer Hunter and Platoon because I feel like those are closer to real...where as I can stomach fictional easier when it comes to real things that happened.

[DFA1979]

Do more people love The Great Escape over Stalag 17 (1953)? Cause I just watched Stalag 17 and I think I prefer that one. J.J. Sefton is more relatable to me as a character and I felt that as fantastic as The Great Escape is Stalag is more realistic.