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View Full Version : Boner reviews the unwatched titles in his DVD collection.



Boner M
01-21-2008, 02:13 AM
Basically, I have too many titles that I haven't watched yet, so I made a thread as an incentive to watch 'em. I'll tell you what I'm watching next, then you guess my rating and I'll rep the closest guess(es).

Also, tell me what I should prioritize:

An Actor's Revenge (Ichikawa)
A Bucket of Blood (Corman)
Good Men, Good Women (Hou)
Kansas City Confidential (Karlson)
Love on the Run (Truffaut)
Moloch (Sokurov)
Moonlighting (Skolimowski)
My Brother's Wedding (Burnett)
Peter Ibbetson (Hathaway)
The River (Tsai)
Spirit of the Beehive (Erice)
The Strange Love of Martha Ivers (Milestone)
Troll (who cares)
Wrong Move (Wenders)

Sven
01-21-2008, 02:17 AM
Here, I will rank them for you, in the order that you should watch them:

A Bucket of Blood (Corman)
An Actor's Revenge (Ichikawa)
Moonlighting (Skolimowski)
Troll (who cares)
Wrong Move (Wenders)
The Strange Love of Martha Ivers (Milestone)
Moloch (Sokurov)
Kansas City Confidential (Karlson)
Peter Ibbetson (Hathaway)
Love on the Run (Truffaut)
The River (Tsai)
Spirit of the Beehive (Erice)
Good Men, Good Women (Hou)

Go, my boner, and watch.

Boner M
01-21-2008, 02:18 AM
Which ones have you seen, sos?

Melville
01-21-2008, 02:27 AM
Man, I haven't even heard of most of those. The River and Spirit of the Beehive are the only two I've seen.

Rowland
01-21-2008, 02:28 AM
The first Troll?

megladon8
01-21-2008, 02:29 AM
I have A Bucket of Blood as well.

I should watch it with Boner.

Sven
01-21-2008, 02:33 AM
Which ones have you seen, sos?

Here is why I structured your list the way I did:

Bucket of Blood is awesome! Dick Miller should be a priority over anything.
Actor's Revenge sounds great and it will be a relief to read a Match Cut review of a Japanese film that isn't directed by Miike or Mizoguchi.
Moonlighting is real good, Irons doing Solidarity, haven't seen it in a while.
Troll, because it's not Troll 2.
Wrong Move, because Wenders is totally slighted around here for some reason, and I'd like to hear more about films of his I haven't seen.
Martha Ivers is a classic, friggin' Douglas and Heflin, boo-ya!
Moloch, haven't seen, but put it here just because.
Kansas City Confidential loses steam, but is still a fun time.
Peter Ibbetson... okay, seriously, a romantic fantasy starring Gary Cooper?
Love on the Run is one I'm not really interested in, but keep in mind that aside from The Wild Child, Truffaut is not really a pleasure for me.
The River I haven't seen either, but Tsai has been discussed to death recently, so he needs a little vacation.
Spirit of the Beehive is in a similar boat: I've read so much about it recently that I'm not ready just yet to read any more.
Good Men, Good Women, if there's any director who doesn't need more discussion right now than Tsai, it's Hou.

So I've seen very little.

transmogrifier
01-21-2008, 02:33 AM
Better titles for this thread:

Boner fills the void (in his DVD collection)

Unloved films revisited by boner

A Stiff Task: Boner on Film

Boner M
01-21-2008, 02:34 AM
Rowland: Yes, the first Troll.

Meg: I'll probably watch Bucket of Blood tonite.

iosos: Thx for the rundown!

trans: Would rep, but I'm tired of repping boner puns. So, pseudo-repped!

Yxklyx
01-21-2008, 02:35 AM
Kansas City Confidential (Karlson) - 8
Peter Ibbetson (Hathaway) - 8
A Bucket of Blood (Corman) - 8
The Strange Love of Martha Ivers (Milestone) - 8
Spirit of the Beehive (Erice) - 7
The River (Tsai) - 6

Derek
01-21-2008, 02:44 AM
I should watch it with Boner.

Unintentional boner jokes are always the best ones. :)

I'd say just make sure to watch An Actor's Revenge and Spirit of the Beehive sooner than later.

transmogrifier
01-21-2008, 02:46 AM
Rowland: Yes, the first Troll.

Meg: I'll probably watch Bucket of Blood tonite.

iosos: Thx for the rundown!

trans: Would rep, but I'm tired of repping boner puns. So, pseudo-repped!


I have yet to be repped for a boner. It's a mammoth oversight.

Derek
01-21-2008, 02:48 AM
Actor's Revenge sounds great and it will be a relief to read a Match Cut review of a Japanese film that isn't directed by Miike or Mizoguchi.


Mizoguchi is overdiscussed here? Aside from Ugetsu appearing on a couple top 50 lists and people recently watching Sansho the Bailiff, which was recently released on DVD, I'd say he's one of the most criminally underseen directors around these parts. I love Kurosawa to death, but it'd be nice if more people saw their 2nd or 3rd Mizoguchi film before their 20th by Kurosawa.

With that said, I agree with the spirit of your post which is in favor of exploring some of the less iconic Japanese directors.

Rowland
01-21-2008, 02:50 AM
I have yet to be repped for a boner. It's a mammoth oversight.Maybe yours just wasn't as impressive as the rest of ours. Don't be embarrassed, as you walk amidst comedic titans.

Sven
01-21-2008, 02:52 AM
Mizoguchi is overdiscussed here? Aside from Ugetsu appearing on a couple top 50 lists and people recently watching Sansho the Bailiff, which was recently released on DVD, I'd say he's one of the most criminally underseen directors around these parts. I love Kurosawa to death, but it'd be nice if more people saw their 2nd or 3rd Mizoguchi film before their 20th by Kurosawa.

It always seems that when people are talking about prolific Japanese filmmakers these days, it's Miike (who I'm just too bored with right now) or Mizoguchi (though I'm totally willing to accept that this is just my imagination running wild). Even Kurosawa has taken a back seat to these two. Maybe I'm just imagining things, but anyway... all's I'm saying is that Ichikawa seems like a more novel choice than the norm.

Winston*
01-21-2008, 02:54 AM
The next 5 poster to make boner puns are going to receive negative rep from me. So you better make damn sure they're worth it.

megladon8
01-21-2008, 02:55 AM
The next 5 poster to make boner puns are going to receive negative rep from me. So you better make damn sure they're worth it.


Oh Winston, don't pull a boner.

megladon8
01-21-2008, 03:02 AM
The next 5 poster to make boner puns are going to receive negative rep from me. So you better make damn sure they're worth it.


Wow, you actually negative repped me for it.

I guess no one can accuse you of not being a man of your word...

Winston*
01-21-2008, 03:08 AM
If you can look into negative rep's eye and still have the strength to make a boner pun, then that was a boner pun worth making.

Sven
01-21-2008, 03:09 AM
Wow, you actually negative repped me for it.

I guess no one can accuse you of not being a man of your word...

Funny thing is, your last post wasn't even a pun.

Winston*
01-21-2008, 03:25 AM
Funny thing is, your last post wasn't even a pun.
Sure it was. It implied both the meanings of boner as a mistake and boner as a poster (by means of the latter's reputation as needlessly crotchety bastard).

Rowland
01-21-2008, 03:28 AM
He was also telling Winston not to be a jerk-off. Hence, don't pull a boner. That shit was like an uber-pun.

Sven
01-21-2008, 03:31 AM
Sure it was. It implied both the meanings of boner as a mistake and boner as a poster (by means of the latter's reputation as needlessly crotchety bastard).

I guess so...

transmogrifier
01-21-2008, 06:06 AM
He was also telling Winston not to be a jerk-off. Hence, don't pull a boner. That shit was like an uber-pun.

I hope he got negatively repped twice.

Boner always gets us into trouble. But there are a few of us that can pull it off.

Spinal
01-21-2008, 06:14 AM
The only one I have seen is Troll. :|

Duncan
01-21-2008, 06:58 AM
Dude, just watch Spirit of the Beehive already.

Sycophant
01-21-2008, 07:09 AM
Are these all you own that you haven't seen? Because mine looks like this:
Trapped by the Mormons
Little Caesar
Public Enemy, The
Petrified Forest, The
Roaring Twenties, The
Go West/ The Big Store
Murder, My Sweet
White Heat
Set-Up, The
Hidden Fortress, The
The Chaplin Revue
400 Blows, The
Bad Sleep Well, The
Alphaville
Good, the Bad, and the Ugly, The
Nashville
Passenger, The
Popeye
Raging Bull
Mr. Vampire
September
Wings of Desire
Another Woman
Unbearable Lightness of Being
Last Temptation of Christ, The
All About Ah Long
Alice
Ju-Dou
Silence of the Lambs, The
Justice, My Foot!
Schindler's List
Legend of Drunken Master, The
Blade, The
Young and Dangerous II
Attack the Gas Station!
Requiem for a Dream
Interview
Traffic
Y Tu Mama Tambien
Invincible
Frailty
Love on a Diet
Public Toilet
Spider
Panic Room
Sea Is Watching, The
Laundry
Quiet American, The
Wilbur Wants to Kill Himself
Springtime In a Small Town
Charlie: The Life and Art of Charles Chaplin
My Architect: A Son's Journey
Tale of Two Sisters, A
Casa de los Babys
Dogville
Adventure of Iron Pussy, The
Lost in Time
Eros
Three… Extremes
Sea Inside, The
Primer
Tae Guk Gi: The Brotherhood of War
She Hate Me
Sucker Free City
Incident at Loch Ness
About Love
Where the Truth Lies
Grizzly Man
Bow, The
Seven Swords
Last Days
Little Children
United 93
Postmodern Life of My Aunt, The
Big Bang Love: Juvenile A
5 centimeters per second
Dororo
Gong Tau
Animal Crackers
A King in New York
Steamboat Bill, Jr.
At the Circus

Boner M
01-21-2008, 07:36 AM
Are these all you own that you haven't seen? Because mine looks like this:
Trapped by the Mormons
Little Caesar
Public Enemy, The
Petrified Forest, The
Roaring Twenties, The
Go West/ The Big Store
Murder, My Sweet
White Heat
Set-Up, The
Hidden Fortress, The
The Chaplin Revue
400 Blows, The
Bad Sleep Well, The
Alphaville
Good, the Bad, and the Ugly, The
Nashville
Passenger, The
Popeye
Raging Bull
Mr. Vampire
September
Wings of Desire
Another Woman
Unbearable Lightness of Being
Last Temptation of Christ, The
All About Ah Long
Alice
Ju-Dou
Silence of the Lambs, The
Justice, My Foot!
Schindler's List
Legend of Drunken Master, The
Blade, The
Young and Dangerous II
Attack the Gas Station!
Requiem for a Dream
Interview
Traffic
Y Tu Mama Tambien
Invincible
Frailty
Love on a Diet
Public Toilet
Spider
Panic Room
Sea Is Watching, The
Laundry
Quiet American, The
Wilbur Wants to Kill Himself
Springtime In a Small Town
Charlie: The Life and Art of Charles Chaplin
My Architect: A Son's Journey
Tale of Two Sisters, A
Casa de los Babys
Dogville
Adventure of Iron Pussy, The
Lost in Time
Eros
Three… Extremes
Sea Inside, The
Primer
Tae Guk Gi: The Brotherhood of War
She Hate Me
Sucker Free City
Incident at Loch Ness
About Love
Where the Truth Lies
Grizzly Man
Bow, The
Seven Swords
Last Days
Little Children
United 93
Postmodern Life of My Aunt, The
Big Bang Love: Juvenile A
5 centimeters per second
Dororo
Gong Tau
Animal Crackers
A King in New York
Steamboat Bill, Jr.
At the Circus
I own about 150 in total, though. I also have cheap noir and Fassbinder boxsets, and a few other titles that I can't think of off the top of head, so I guess there's about 20-30 more unwatched.

Boner M
01-21-2008, 12:00 PM
A Bucket of Blood (Roger Corman, 1959)

http://cache.eb.com/eb/image?id=61727&rendTypeId=4

"It's brilliant - both in conceit and execution!"

This is the first Corman-directed film I've seen, to my knowledge (my eyes are too tired to scroll through his ridiculous filmography on the IMDb). And boy howdy, it's a good one. This pretty much puts Zwigoff's limp Art School Confidential to shame in it's skewering of the pretention of the art world, and still feels totally fresh today. There's something almost fail-safe about the premise - shy busboy becomes modern art's 'next big thing' after covering up an accidental murder of a cat by turning it's corpse into a sculpture, leading to an increasingly less circumstantial spree of human murders-turned-masterpieces - and though the pretension of the beat generations comes under attack, the film evolves more interestingly into a critique of the the role of commerce and the dubious nature of 'realism' in art. And then there's Dick Miller, whose Walter Paisley would become his signature role, at his creepy and awkward best as the accidental artist who keeps on killing, being all to familiar with the rejection that having his cover blown would result in. Altogether, a sharp and hilarious satire, even managing to find time for genuine pathos and an affectingly tragic climax.

Also, someone clue me in: is Miller reprising that role in subsequent films where he goes by Walter Pasiley, or is it merely an in-joke that runs throughout his career?

Dukefrukem
01-21-2008, 12:02 PM
what a great idea for a thread. i want to make one and post it so people can tell me what to watch first and wahtnot.

Rowland
01-21-2008, 02:14 PM
I'm glad you liked it, Boner. I was pleasantly surprised by A Bucket of Blood as well. Given Corman's reputation, I was expecting a sleazy cheapie, and instead the movie was sophisticated, hilarious, and affecting.

Raiders
01-21-2008, 04:35 PM
A Bucket of Blood is awesomesauce. If not for The Intruder, it would be Corman's best.

jesse
01-21-2008, 05:16 PM
I'm curious what you think about Peter Ibbetson in light of Kevin's analysis of it a few months ago. It sounded really interesting, though not on the level of "OMG I need to see this ASAP!"

And Spirit of the Beehive, of course.

Boner M
02-01-2008, 01:31 AM
The River (Tsai Ming-Liang, 1997)

http://bp0.blogger.com/_nDdQ7r4bDVY/Rms7E5eAJqI/AAAAAAAAAc8/XsFoN02K8NY/s320/The+River.jpg

Another Tsai film, another fluid-heavy meditation on urban alienation. Not that I'm complaining, though it is admittedly a little unnerving at how easily he seems to be able to crank 'em out; I'm starting to understand why some were less enthralled by I Don't Want To Sleep Alone than I was. The main difference between this one and his recent work is that it's a little less formally rigorous, with a more liberal camera movement, and there's a lack of the Tati-esque visual gags. Any humour derives from the unrelenting misery of the precedings; especially featuring the son's skin affliction, whose scenes of pained writhing are protracted for such maximum tactility that our only relief is through the nervous laughter that those scenes arouse.

As per usual, it's Tsai focus on the private routines and rituals of his characters that makes their alienation register so palpably. Rarely does each member of the family occupy the frame, let alone the scene; the elliptical storytelling show how they only find solace or feeling when absorbed in those private activities. When there is any sort of drama, the distant, long static shots make us focus on the subjects' flailing limbs rather than their faces, reducing the people in the frame to some sort of physical abstractions. The most striking scenes are the father's constant visits to the public saunas for sex, where we see his encounters with anonymous men through a sliver of light in different corners of the frame for each one, depicting those encounters as purely sensual rather than emotional ones. The pained lack of communication and connection all builds up to one of cinema's great "holy shit" moments, that I already knew about beforehand but is nonetheless quite shocking in the film's context. At first I was a little disappointed by the ending's lack of resolution or catharsis, but after reminding myself of the allegorical dimension of the son's illness, the film has settled well. Thumbs-up again, Mr. Tsai.

Also worth pointing out is the film's hilariously middlebrow-aimed trailer included on the DVD, with a sweeping Chen Kaige-esque score and baritone-voiced narration that actually says "...because life is like a river". LOLZ.

MacGuffin
02-01-2008, 01:42 AM
I think I may have fallen asleep or something during The River. :sad:

Rowland
02-01-2008, 02:23 AM
I'm starting to understand why some were less enthralled by I Don't Want To Sleep Alone than I was. The main difference between this one and his recent work is that it's a little less formally rigorous, with a more liberal camera movement, and there's a lack of the Tati-esque visual gags.I don't know... I didn't think much of I Don't Want To Sleep Alone either, but I loved What Time Is It There?, which I don't recall having a single camera movement, and it had lots of visual gags. Why someone likes some films but not others can't be reduced to such broad reasoning.

Boner M
02-01-2008, 02:38 AM
. Why someone likes some films but not others can't be reduced to such broad reasoning.
Read the paragraph again; I didn't offer the second sentence of that quote as a reason why some weren't as enthralled as IDWTSA as I was, but rather because it covered a lot of the same ground as his earlier films, and if you'd seen them beforehand (which I didn't at the time) then I could understand how someone could find his latest a little redundant.

Rowland
02-01-2008, 02:42 AM
Read the paragraph again; I didn't offer the second sentence of that quote as a reason why some weren't as enthralled as IDWTSA as I was, but rather because it covered a lot of the same ground as his earlier films, and if you'd seen them beforehand (which I didn't at the time) then I could understand how someone could find his latest a little redundant.I missed the semi-colon... blast. :)