28 Film Discussion Threads Later

[Pop Trash]

I find Brazil to be depressing. Mostly in how much it closely resembles contemporary bureaucratic hell and technology that barely works, even though it's set in "the future."

[Pop Trash]

Alfonso Cuaron's A Little Princess is wonderful.

I remember thinking the 90s adaptation of The Secret Garden was quite nice as well.

[Ezee E]

Watching Possession from my Karagarga downloads. I had to verify that I was watching the correct movie. All I knew was that it was a girl being possessed... Instead it starts out as a marital dysfunction movie. Ha. Kinda weird.

And is that The Godfather score?

Stuff sure gets weird after 40 mins.

[B-side]

Watching Possession from my Karagarga downloads. I had to verify that I was watching the correct movie. All I knew was that it was a girl being possessed... Instead it starts out as a marital dysfunction movie. Ha. Kinda weird.

You're in for a helluva ride.

[soitgoes...]

I think I lost my chance to see Tree of Life in the theaters. I only have one possible night left free to see it, and I doubt I'll be going to the movies then. Stupid life getting in the way.

[Mara]

I remember thinking the 90s adaptation of The Secret Garden was quite nice as well.

It's pretty nice.

I don't know if I'd consider Searching for Bobby Fischer a kids' movie, but if it is, it's a good one.

And has nobody mentioned Babe and Babe: Pig in the City? Because those are both great, although quite different from one another.

[Spinal]

Anyone watched this?

[youtube]FE_nr2t6fKQ[/youtube]

Seems like Barty porn.

[Sven]

Seems like Barty porn.

I've only read the story, but yeah, pretty much.

[Irish]

Anyone watched this?

Never thought that story was any good, and definitely not something to base a movie on. Looks like they took the premise and slapped a 1984ish lone rebel romance onto it.

[Spinal]

But, you know, it's really great to see Julie Hagerty still working.

[StanleyK]

The Headless Woman is quite a singular experience. For a first viewing it's almost inaccessible, but so was La Ciénaga for me. I'm sure it will prove more rewarding with time. I wasn't expecting something this layered and subtle, although given that it's Martel I should have been. Her craft continues evolving while still maintaining a style that's distinctly hers; she may the best filmmaker around right now, right alongside Weerasethakul.

[Stay Puft]

The Headless Woman has one of the best final shots in a movie. That image has lingered since I saw the film last year. It's such a tightly woven film, so precise in its framing. That image of the child getting up from the bedside, walking out of the room... gosh, amazing how much Martel suggests with simple juxtapositions and use of space... the film spins the most rich and elaborate atmosphere out of the most mundane and even meaningless pieces of narrative information (the child like a ghost, the scene as if out of a haunted house horror movie... an echo of the protagonist's guilt, but really just her/my projection onto random data). It's masterful narrative filmmaking, even, the way Martel develops suspense and drama out of a thoroughly unambiguous situation (e.g. she shows us exactly what happens at the beginning of the movie, proceeds to make a movie as if we didn't clearly see what had happened; it's an excellent example of dramatic irony). I suppose that makes it clinical in some sense (and the film is sharp and straightforward in its class criticism, I think) but I never found it less than thoroughly absorbing.

I need to see her earlier films, because this one keeps creeping up more and more in my estimation. One of my recent favorites, for sure.

[Rowland]

Hmm, I have a vague recollection of considering The Headless Woman a formally engaging treatise on subjectivity from which I can hardly recall any specifics. Looking up my thoughts from about a year ago confirms this, and that it really seems like the sort of film I should have responded to more positively than I did, but it sure didn't leave much of a lasting impression for whatever reason.

[Mara]

But, you know, it's really great to see Julie Hagerty still working.

I like her, too.

And I like the short story quite a bit, even though it's a little over-the-top and obvious. But considering that the trailer just showed 95% of the story, I'm unclear how they're going to make an entire film out of it.

Wait... I guess it's a short film. 26 minutes.

[Kurosawa Fan]

I don't think I could have had a worse introduction to Powell & Pressburger than I Know Where I'm Going!. There was absolutely zero chemistry between the two leads (I still have no idea when they actually fell in love, nor why he would have wanted anything to do with her), didn't care much for either lead performance, found the story pretty dull, as it seemed more content with giving a history of northern Scotland than with actually developing character, and found the reveal of the curse at the end laughable. I had planned to watch The Red Shoes, but my son had a friend spend the night, which of course meant my plans went out the window. By the time I could sit down with a movie, I needed something much shorter.

[StanleyK]

I need to see her earlier films, because this one keeps creeping up more and more in my estimation. One of my recent favorites, for sure.

Man, yes. It may be her most formally accomplished film yet, and that's saying something.

Hmm, I have a vague recollection of considering The Headless Woman a formally engaging treatise on subjectivity from which I can hardly recall any specifics. Looking up my thoughts from about a year ago confirms this, and that it really seems like the sort of film I should have responded to more positively than I did, but it sure didn't leave much of a lasting impression for whatever reason.

Funny, I thought it started out really interesting, then got a bit frustrated with how oblique it was, then I started appreciating its economical storytelling as much as the disorienting compositions which compliment it. I didn't even pick up on the class stuff which seemed so obvious to every reviewer, probably because I was mostly fixated on Vero's reactions to her environment. It's so refreshing to see a film so free of exposition and so trusting of its audience's intelligence.

[NickGlass]

I don't think I could have had a worse introduction to Powell & Pressburger than I Know Where I'm Going!. There was absolutely zero chemistry between the two leads (I still have no idea when they actually fell in love, nor why he would have wanted anything to do with her), didn't care much for either lead performance, found the story pretty dull, as it seemed more content with giving a history of northern Scotland than with actually developing character, and found the reveal of the curse at the end laughable. I had planned to watch The Red Shoes, but my son had a friend spend the night, which of course meant my plans went out the window. By the time I could sit down with a movie, I needed something much shorter.

I found it pretty lackluster, too. Thelma Schoonmaker was being honored, alongside her late husband (Powell), at a film festival I attended back in 2005. For some odd reason, Thelma chose this as a hidden gem in his oeuvre and introduced the film at a screening. I'm sure she's just tired of seeing his actually great films screened in a theater again, but of all the Powell/Pressburger films to screen on the big screen...this is not the one.

[Raiders]

Actually, I think Schoonmaker just has better taste than yous guys.

[Raiders]

Admittedly, I Know Where I'm Going's central thesis on the nice countryside people representing a kind of cultural purity and superior lifestyle is silly, but I can think of many quality films that make an argument on the superiority of specific lifestyles, especially those more in-line with simplicity and nature, so it doesn't seem all that detrimental to me. More important I think is how much like a little folktale ditty the film feels. It's more of a simple film from P&P, not among their more extravagent and complex, both narratively and visually. But it is very charming in the way it accepts so quickly the romance by making Livesey's character so ingrained in the landscape and part of this community and the island's history that it fulfills Hiller's intoxication with this place (the film shows us she initially was so drawn to her to-be husband believing him the laird of the area and when that is quickly deflated, this desire only has one place to go). Her love is not just specifically for him, but for the entire experience of this place which P&P sketch out more as a travelogue history than a typical romance, enveloping the experience as not so much a Brief Encounter-style physical attraction but one more of a spiritual clinging as Hiller is shifting her lifestyle and perspective.

It's a simple, folksly view of life (the fishermen chastising her rich fiance for inhabiting the land while not trying to be "part of" the land) but I like the way the film actually takes time to integrate itself into its landscapes; how Powell chose to make vignettes like the hunting eagle and incorporate a lot of heritage into the film. A lot of romances with the foreigner and native make the culture clash all about how two people interact in romantic ways and not about how to really work, the new culture itself must lure the foreigner and have him/her become a part of the surroundings. I found it very charming and well done.

[number8]

Goddamn, this is a thing of beauty. Fuckin' Struzan.

[Grouchy]

I haven't seen I Know Where I'm Going! (nor any other Powell & Pressburger films for that matter) but I have read Scorsese praise it as a forgotten masterpiece.

[Yxklyx]

I haven't seen I Know Where I'm Going! (nor any other Powell & Pressburger films for that matter) but I have read Scorsese praise it as a forgotten masterpiece.

It's one of my favorite P&Ps - to each his own.

[Rowland]

Let Me In (Reeves 10) - 5.5

Pretty much. A solid cover version of the original, with all the implications such an analogy merits.

[Raiders]

Let Me In is the best film of 2010 I have seen. I don't feel I need to have seen the original to qualify either.

[Ezee E]

Let Me In is the best film of 2010 I have seen. I don't feel I need to have seen the original to qualify either.

They're both fascinating to me. I think this is a case of preferring whichever one you end up seeing first. I can't wait to see what Matt Reeves has up next.