28 Film Discussion Threads Later

**Ezee E** · 10-11-2011, 01:10 AM

Quoting Irish (view post)

It's Harry Knowles' annual event in Austin. You have to apply to get tickets. There are 200 seats, and last year Ain't It Cool claimed 10,000 people applied.

10K? Wow. I figured it was like 500, haha.

**Philosophe_rouge** · 10-11-2011, 01:47 AM

Shame is among the best films I've seen in years. Over a month since I've seen it, I still think about it almost daily. I was not a huge fan of Hunger, I found it intriguing but middling and dull for some stretches.

**B-side** · 10-11-2011, 11:31 AM

Frammartino's first feature, The Gift, is purified semi-documentary cinema. Any sound beyond that of the working people seems alien. Intrusive. A marching band's music is a cacophony that easily encompasses the entire village. Cars and mopeds feel like loud and strange visitors. Any dialogue is mere atmospheric sound. The handful of lines are usually background noise. It's a compliment to the film that the most dramatic aspect is when a boy loses his ball down the winding and labyrinthine roads and alleys and eventually off the cliff the town resides on. The architecture of concrete is roughly organized and beginning to crumble. This is as pared down and image-driven as narrative cinema gets, and it's pretty terrific.

**dreamdead** · 10-11-2011, 01:29 PM

Rowland,

Since the Three Times debacle, how has your university film studies course been?

**Yxklyx** · 10-11-2011, 01:47 PM

Quoting Ivan Drago (view post)

What the hell is this movie marathon and how did you get in on it? What else do you have to watch?

And what's the MC consensus on Le Amiche? I saw a trailer for it before Stalker a while back and thought it looked interesting. Also thought the trailer for it was interesting too, considering it had the same trailer structure as old American Hollywood movies of the 40s.

I liked it a lot. It's like a Sirk film but with Antonioni's sensibilities.

**Rowland** · 10-11-2011, 05:11 PM

Quoting dreamdead (view post)

Rowland,

Since the Three Times debacle, how has your university film studies course been?

It's better, at least in the sense that we've been watching some classics that I've neglected, so first time viewings of A Trip to the Moon, Strike, Modern Times, and Singin' in the Rain have been cool. The class has seemed a bit more engaged as the material has grown more modern (I was surprised by how well Singin' in the Rain played), and while the instructor's methods are still sloppy, I've discovered that he's a grad student teaching his first class, so I have a bit more empathy for the guy.

**B-side** · 10-12-2011, 04:34 AM

Quoting Boner M (view post)

Kairat (Omirbaev, 1992) ***

I need thoughts. Not sure I like that you watched it on YouTube, but I'll try not to nitpick.:P

**Boner M** · 10-12-2011, 04:53 AM

Quoting Brightside (view post)

Not sure I like that you watched it on YouTube, but I'll try not to nitpick.:P

Yeah, I should've watched it on a glorious 35mm print like you always do.

I thought it was gonna be amazing with that opening scene, of staccato shots aboard and outside trains with a stone finally shattering the train window (the reprisal of that shot at nighttime later on is stunning, too) introducing the credits, but it eventually became a little too elliptical to really cohere into an absorbing character piece. I was kinda lost by the end. Still, a great film of moments - I'm sure I've seen a closeup of man and a woman's arms touching on public transport, but it feels especially erotically charged in this context. Omirbaev really seems to absorbed Hitchcock and Bresson into a style of his own; the innate pleasure in train scenes and men following women of the former, and the expressivity between images (rather than within them) of the latter. Also like how the blurring of dream and reality emphasising how the drudgery of the protag's life has colonised his subconscious.

Plus, it's really damn funny at times in the deadpan Kaurismaki-ish way; the girl on the train's stonefaced line-reading of "a bee stung my tongue" brought me many lolz.

**Boner M** · 10-12-2011, 04:56 AM

What else of his have you seen, btw?

**B-side** · 10-12-2011, 05:01 AM

Quoting Boner M (view post)

Yeah, I should've watched it on a glorious 35mm print like you always do.

sshhhh

I thought it was gonna be amazing with that opening scene, of staccato shots aboard and outside trains with a stone finally shattering the train window (the reprisal of that shot at nighttime later on is stunning, too) introducing the credits, but it eventually became a little too elliptical to really cohere into an absorbing character piece. I was kinda lost by the end. Still, a great film of moments - I'm sure I've seen a closeup of man and a woman's arms touching on public transport, but it feels especially erotically charged in this context. Omirbaev really seems to absorbed Hitchcock and Bresson into a style of his own; the innate pleasure in train scenes and men following women of the former, and the expressivity between images (rather than within them) of the latter. Also like how the blurring of dream and reality emphasising how the drudgery of the protag's life has colonised his subconscious.

Plus, it's really damn funny at times in the deadpan Kaurismaki-ish way; the girl on the train's stonefaced line-reading of "a bee stung my tongue" brought me many lolz.

Hm. Well, I'm glad you liked it.

What else of his have you seen, btw?

Nothing yet, but he's got a few more on KG with subs.

**Qrazy** · 10-12-2011, 06:07 AM

America, America felt like Kazan's take on an Italian film. Definitely a unique work in his oeuvre, very different stylistically than anything else he ever did. The film was quite good, not one of his best but it's fairly hard for him to top himself.

**Grouchy** · 10-12-2011, 06:38 AM

Quoting Qrazy (view post)

America, America felt like Kazan's take on an Italian film. Definitely a unique work in his oeuvre, very different stylistically than anything else he ever did. The film was quite good, not one of his best but it's fairly hard for him to top himself.

I liked that a lot. I thought it was a movie that had the density of classic literature at times.

EDIT: Whatever the shit that means.

**Russ** · 10-13-2011, 01:26 AM

Since Drive premiered, there's been a lot of renewed interest in Nicolas Winding Refn lately, so I'm wondering if anyone here has seen/can reco his earlier film, Fear X. I've got it queued up next. Anyone a fan? Like to hear some thoughts.

**Rowland** · 10-13-2011, 02:21 AM

We watched the first half of Birth of a Nation in my film history class, I'm thinking I'll finish the rest of it on Netflix Instant since the instructor ever so benevolently decided to spare us the post-Civil-War half, which I understand contains most of the film's allegedly offensive material.

Winston* · 10-13-2011, 02:33 AM

I'm not sure you should be showing The Birth of a Nation if you are going to skip the second half. What was the instructor trying to illustrate with the film?

**Rowland** · 10-13-2011, 04:45 AM

Quoting Winston* (view post)

I'm not sure you should be showing The Birth of a Nation if you are going to skip the second half. What was the instructor trying to illustrate with the film?

Early developments in visual narrative storytelling. He spent more time discussing Griffith's pioneering use of color filters than the dubious politics of the material.

**EyesWideOpen** · 10-13-2011, 05:49 AM

Two amazon reviews for The Orphanage:

"DID NOT REALIZE THIS MOVIE WAS IN SPANISH (MY FAULT I GUESS). DO NOT WANT TO READ WHILE WATCHING MOVIES YOU MISS TOO MUCH. TOSSED IT"

"I BOUGHT THIS FILM, ASSUMING I'D BE ABLE TO WATCH IT IN ENGLISH SINCE I LIVE IN NEW YORK CITY AND THIS IS A PRIMARILY ENGLISH SPEAKING TOWN. YOU WILL NOT BE ABLE TO WATCH THIS MOVIE IF YOU DON'T UNDERSTAND SPANISH. WHY THE PRODUCERS OF THIS FILM FAILED TO FILM IT WITH ENGLISH SPEAKING ACTORS IS BEYOND ME. AT THE VERY LEAST THEY COULD HAVE DUBBED THE FILM IN ENGLISH WITH VOICE-OVER ACTORS SO WE COULD UNDERSTAND THE PLOT. I HAD TO GIVE THIS DVD TO A MEXICAN FRIEND WHO COULD AT LEAST WATCH IT. THE DIRECTOR AND PRODUCER OF THIS FILM WASTED THEIR TIME IN MAKING A MOVIE FOR THE SPANISH SPEAKING MARKET ONLY. HEY, NO SE HABLA AND NO SE COMPRENDE SPANISH!"

**Watashi** · 10-13-2011, 08:10 AM

People speak English in New York?

**Dukefrukem** · 10-13-2011, 01:58 PM

**elixir** · 10-13-2011, 02:09 PM

But, How to Train Your Dragon > Toy Story 3.

**Dukefrukem** · 10-13-2011, 02:13 PM

Quoting elixir (view post)

But, How to Train Your Dragon > Toy Story 3.

I think I would actually say

How to Train Your Dragon & Kung-Fu Panda > Toy Story 2 & 3

**Mara** · 10-13-2011, 03:00 PM

Also, The Prince of Egypt is underrated.

Chicken Run and Wallace & Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit are both great.

**Ezee E** · 10-13-2011, 03:20 PM

Yeah, pretty dumb. Toy Story could easily be on the dreamworks side...

They're toys... BUT THEY HAVE LIVES.

**Sven** · 10-13-2011, 03:22 PM

While saying nothing of Dreamworks, I can think of little else regarding contemporary film-related attitudes more ludicrous than the pedestalization of Pixar. Have they made great films? Yes. Have they made poor ones? Oh yes. Let go.

**Sven** · 10-13-2011, 03:23 PM

Quoting Mara (view post)

Chicken Run and Wallace & Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit are both great.

Well, obviously, Aardman is the superior studio.

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