Recently Watched Films 2013

[Dan Warburton]

Joseph L. Mankiewicz, Somewhere in the Night, 1946

With a plot even more convoluted and labyrinthine than The Maltese Falcon and The Big Sleep, and unfortunately lacking a Bogart to bring the tortured amnesiac hero off in real style - though John Hodiak does a good job - and an authentic femme fatale to drag him down, Mankiewicz gets himself in a bit of a jam in his first noir, and has to tie up loose ends by having the characters explain the story to us themselves instead of letting the film show it. Always a little disappointing, but I'll excuse a little wordiness if it's Mankiewicz wordiness.

[Dan Warburton]

Hal Hartley, Amateur, 1994

Hartley gets it wrong here, trying his hand at doing sex and violence but ending up with a rather pale imitation of Godard (specifically Bande à Part, but the shot above is a clear reference to the famous TV hand in Prénom Carmen) with a dash of Blue Velvet thrown in for good measure. Isabelle Huppert seems miscast - not that she can't play the garce (Coup de Torchon) but she's better doing fragile and weary (La Dentellière).. nun perhaps but nymphomaniac, nah - there's nothing in the script to indicate she should be of foreign origin (unlike the other female lead, Elina Löwensohn, who clearly hails from Europe). The dialogue that sparkles in Trust and The Unbelievable Truth falls flat here, raising an occasional smile but rarely a laugh. Donovan's dry and deadpan in Trust but here he's just dead, and the humour of minor characters - the two assassins comparing their mobile phones, Melville the oversensitive policewoman - feels forced. Worst of all is the lack of pace, with "meaningful" forlorn piano notes in all the wrong places.

[Lao Tsu Ben]

Yes, you nail it. Since I think Henry Fool could be his masterpiece, and I love No Such Thing and The Book of Life, I wouldn't say that it was the beginning of the end for Hartley, but with Flirt one year later, it's clear that inspiration was somewhat lacking at the time, though I thought that Damian Young was quite funny in Amateur.




Billy Bathgate - Robert Benton, 1991

One could think there is no shortage of talent in this, but the script by Tom Stoppard is generic, ditto Benton's direction. What stands out is Nestor Almendros' cinematography (it was his last job), with production values and a young Nicole Kidman to match - and don't take that as a sexist remark. I have a fondness for academic films at times, but that one definitely falls flat. Billy looks too much like a simpleton for us to care, and I realized I don't like Dustin Hoffman's voice very much. It's a shame there isn't any rhythm in the editing, the art direction alone almost had me interested.

[Lao Tsu Ben]

To The Wonder, Terrence Malick, 2013

Worse than I thought, and the fact is there is nothing surprising about this film. Even the cinematography ends up feeling dull.To say the truth, it ceased being exciting twenty minutes into the Tree of Life. As far as I'm concerned, this film is a joke.

[fslmy]

The Tree of Life was one of the best cinematic experiences of my life. About 15 minutes into the movie, just as I was thinking about walking out, two girls in the front row who I assume were high starting giggling uncontrollably which resulted in the entire theater erupting into laughter for a good 10 minutes.

[Dan Warburton]

Agnès Varda, Kung-fu Master, 1987

Lolita the other way round - middle-aged divorcée falls for 14-yr-old boy in the era of arcade video games, AIDS and Spitting Image. See how many of these youngsters you recognise http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GG_pK-J7T4g

[Dan Warburton]

Raoul Walsh, White Heat, 1949

Love the little details.. the chicken leg, for instance. Or Virginia Mayo spitting her gum out. Cagney is a total psycho. Top of the world, all right.

[Lao Tsu Ben]

Naked, Mike Leigh, 1993

That's more like it. Great film and one of the few that does justice to David Thewlis's talent (his is a frustrating filmography, or so it seems). It's funny how Leigh and Hal Hartley, through different methods and in different places (but at the same time), achieved something that is not entirely dissimilar. Of course you think of Céline too, it's far from drab realism, and that's what I like about the film- the yuppie is not so much a stereotype as some sort of nightmarish and terrifying creature, one that wouldn't be out of place in an Alex Cox film, say Revenger's Tragedy. It's your typical English, perverse bad buy. I'm also fond of those films with an Odyssean, or Ulysses-like structure that go on over the course of one or several (days and) nights and end one early morning, such as Three Businessmen, of which I also thought.

[Dan Warburton]

Hadn't made the Céline connection, but now that you mention it.. Not my favourite Leigh this, but Thewlis is extraordinary, and Lesley Sharp's Louise is quietly impressive. Love the song at the end. Nice potty cameos from Peter Wight and Ewen Bremner ("Maggie!!"), but Sophie and Jeremy do rather spoil it for me. Anyway, I was away for a few days and found a caviste in Chinon, of all places, with a rather impressive collection of single malts, so brought a couple back but decided not to open either of them at all after watching this -



Billy Wilder, The Lost Weekend, 1945

Great stuff, from the Third Avenue El (torn down in 1955) to the hellview of Bellevue. The happy ending is about as happy as Nick Ray's in Bigger Than Life.. did the book end this way (anyone read it?) or was it just another sop to the Production Code?

[Dan Warburton]

Costa-Gavras, Missing, 1982

[Dan Warburton]

Rainer Werner Fassbinder, Ich will doch nur, daß ihr mich liebt, 1976

RWF's TV stuff, with the possible exception of Berlin Alexanderplatz, seems to get passed over all too easily, but this is another cracker, all Freudian slips, doppelgangers and mirrors, with beautiful camera work (as ever) from the mighty Ballhaus and fine performances from a cast not drawn, for once, from RWF's usual troupe - Vitus Zeplichal is terrific as Peter. The Park Circus DVD (which I can recommend - they're the folks who reissued Despair last year) comes with a splendid hourlong documentary on the film too.

[Lao Tsu Ben]

Sunshine, Danny Boyle, 2007

To my surprise, I loved the beginning. As the ship smoothly makes his way through space toward the sun, there is a stunning impression of tranquility and awe (new-agey as it may be), the memory of which is almost enough to sustain interest throughout the remaining part. So if Boyle and his scenarist were really onto something in the first few minutes, I must say that I tended to become less interested as the peripeteia piled up, they are not very convincing, and Boyle's proclivity to emulate illustrious predecessors finally feels exaggerated and muddled ; the slasher part didn't do much for me for instance. Still, I appreciated the effort.

[Dan Warburton]

Harmony Korine, Mister Lonely, 2006

A real trip, this - and the anecdotes of Richard Strange, who plays the hilariously foul-mouthed Abraham Lincoln lookalike, are well worth a read http://www.blouinartinfo.com/news/story ... nds-fling/ - what with Werner Herzog playing a Catholic priest ("when we get to the Vatican I want to have a drink with the Pope.. he's from Bavaria!") to kamikaze nuns jumping out of planes without parachutes, to Denis Lavant's vicious Charlie Chaplin (even his wife, Marilyn Monroe, tells him he's more like Adolf Hitler) and Diego Luna's Michael Jackson dance steps in the Tuileries Gardens, you never quite know what to make of it. The strangest bits are often the most mundane - David Lynch comes to mind here, as in the choice of a Bobby Vinton song as a movie title - and there are as many moments of genuine tenderness (Herzog's absolution of his adulterous pilot, Marilyn and Michael swapping strawberries) as there are of ineptitude and complete bewilderment. But some truly memorable images - the skydiving nun with the bicycle, wow (eat yr heart out Terry Malick), Little Red Riding Hood wandering a deserted railway line - and a solid soundtrack by Sun City Girls and Jason Spaceman (not to mention plenty of tasty oldies). God knows what it all means, but that's hardly the point - you're not likely to forget it once you've seen it

[Matt Wuethrich]

Here's my viewing over the last couple of weeks:



Walkabout, Nicholas Roeg, 1971

Aside from all the sun-baked imagery, what I appreciated the most in this was Roeg's attempt to put off passing judgement on civilization. He doesn't succeed of course (nor did he probably intend to), but when the boy and girl at last find a road and then make their way to the village, you can't help but share in their relief, especially the girl's. The fact that you identify far more with that feeling than anything the aborigine goes through is Roeg's insight here: Even tough a return to some pre-industrial paradise sounds nice, giving it up goes against our instincts.



The Thin Blue Line, Errol Morris, 1988

Like Dreyer trusts in faces (see below), Morris trusts in people's own words and own perspectives to carry the story (not that he thinks all of them are telling the truth. These interview scenes are so simple and so effective.



The Killing of a Chinese Bookie, Jon Cassavetes, 1976

The dressing room pep-talk (Is that even the right word?) towards the end might be one of my favorite scenes ever.



The Passion of Joan of Arc, Carl Th. Dreyer, 1928

Hypnotic and exhausting. The notes (in the extensive and very intriguing book that comes with the Masters of Cinema edition) are right: watching the near endless sequence of close-ups of emoting faces wears you out. You're not having a story told so much as you're experiencing its strata of feeling instead. It doesn't hurt that you can stare at every wrinkle and blemish on the characters' faces. I watched with Loren Connors soundtrack. While I liked it, especially how he avoided any obvious emotional themes or climatic moments, I think watching in silence (Dreyer's preferred mode apparently) might be the way to go.



Au revoir les enfants, Louis Malle, 1987

This could have ended up as sentimental twaddle but Malle keeps proper distance throughout. The fact that the key line of the film gets uttered almost in passing is representative of Malle's touch with the material. Must have been hard to stay so removed from what is apparently quite autobiographical material.

[Matt Wuethrich]

Robert Wiene, Das Cabinet des Dr. Caligari, 1920

Story's a bit naff, and the acting over the top, but those sets.. what a trip.

Those sets were done by Hermann Warm, who also did the sets for The Passion of Joan of Arc. I bring this up not for trivia but to underline how magnificent Joan is. The fact that Dreyer spends probably 80% of the film locked in on people's faces from the neck up, yet still felt compelled to build a full-on model city in the French countryside, just shows what a complete vision that film is. Surely one of the more unique film experiences I've had.

[Dan Warburton]

Here's my viewing over the last couple of weeks

Que des classiques! (Thin Blue Line perhaps excepted )

Walkabout, Nicholas Roeg, 1971

Thanks for reminding me to watch this again, with the director's commentary (if I can stomach it). Some extraordinary scenes.. that A.E. Housman poem at the end tears me up every time.

The Killing of a Chinese Bookie, Jon Cassavetes, 1976

Definitely one of my (and the board's) favourites for sure.

The Passion of Joan of Arc, Carl Th. Dreyer, 1928

Hypnotic and exhausting. The notes (in the extensive and very intriguing book that comes with the Masters of Cinema edition) are right: watching the near endless sequence of close-ups of emoting faces wears you out.

Yeah, especially Artaud's..

I watched with Loren Connors soundtrack. While I liked it, especially how he avoided any obvious emotional themes or climatic moments, I think watching in silence (Dreyer's preferred mode apparently) might be the way to go.

Yes, I haven't tried it with Connors yet. Next time - but it's such an overwhelming experience I'm not sure when next time will be.. Thanks for the info on the Caligari sets too - didn't know that.

[Dan Warburton]

Carlo Lizzani, Banditi a Milano, 1968

I'm inclined to agree with the punter over at IMDb who writes that Billy Friedkin and Marty Scorsese must have seen this before making, respectively, The French Connection and Mean Streets - Lizzani's film deserves to be just as highly regarded (and cleaned up, dusted off, redubbed and treated to a BluRay reissue). Wasn't there a question about favourite car chases in one of those film quizzes we had? I'll change my vote for this: the high-speed pursuit through the streets of Milan, with Gian Maria Volonte shooting wildly at innocent bystanders to throw the cops off, is lterally breathtaking. Not without its de rigueur dose of trashy gallows/giallo humour (love Tomas Milian's exchanges with the lonely lady of Lugano.. "can't you send me a big strong police officer?") and tacky music - Riz Ortolani, yep, but there's also some wonderfully cheesy Nino Ferrer - great stuff. Another glass raised to KG's Featured Torrents, salute!

[Matt Wuethrich]

Here's my viewing over the last couple of weeks

Que des classiques! (Thin Blue Line perhaps excepted )

I definitely prefer Gates of Heaven and Vernon, Florida over this one. Re-enactments are never good, even when they're deployed to effective ends as they are here.

Walkabout, Nicholas Roeg, 1971

Thanks for reminding me to watch this again, with the director's commentary (if I can stomach it). Some extraordinary scenes.. that A.E. Housman poem at the end tears me up every time.

What happened to Lao Tsu Ben's comment? I'd agree that sympathies are with the aborigine and his end is gutting, but for me the twist in the film comes in how I instinctively identified with the girl. Racist is one word for her, but it's racism born of ignorance. She doesn't know any better. The tension in their meeting is waiting to see if her curiosity will win out over her fear.

[Matt Wuethrich]

Rainer Werner Fassbinder, Ich will doch nur, daß ihr mich liebt, 1976

RWF's TV stuff, with the possible exception of Berlin Alexanderplatz, seems to get passed over all too easily,

So would this be a good place to start with Fassbinder or should I go all in with Berlin Alexanderplatz?

[jon abbey]

Rainer Werner Fassbinder, Ich will doch nur, daß ihr mich liebt, 1976

RWF's TV stuff, with the possible exception of Berlin Alexanderplatz, seems to get passed over all too easily,

So would this be a good place to start with Fassbinder or should I go all in with Berlin Alexanderplatz?

neither, go with something like Fox and His Friends or Ali: Fear Eats The Soul. BA should wait until you've seen a bunch of shorter ones.