Recently Watched Films 2011

[Gaendaal]

Conan The Barbarian (2011, Marcus Nispel)

Ah hah hah hah haaaah! So very, very bad and so very, very much wrong with it but Crom take me if I didn't enjoy it immensely.



Comfort Of Strangers (1990, Paul Schrader)

Unlike this tiresome nonsense. Couldn't even raise a scintilla of interest in anything that happened. How do you even start to go about making Helen Mirren seem boring?! Jeez.

[johnson]

Appropriate choice for someone called "Johnson"

Haha! I wish I could edit that damn username.

[mudd]

i can change your username for you if you need it, just send me a private message.

m

[Dan Warburton]

Rainer Werner Fassbinder, Welt am Draht ("World on a Wire"), 1973

Saw Part One only last night, so don't be mean and tell me what happens in Part Two! But great to get hold of this at last in a good quality DVD restored print. More tomorrow when I get my head round it, if I can.

So, got to the end of this 207-minute sci-fi epic last night, reeling. Have to say Part Two is a little more conventional thriller fare, man on the run from hostile world, very Saboteur (and there's a tongue in cheek reference to Hitch at one point "Hahn.. the man who knew too much"). But there's a lot of Alphaville in there too, confirmed by the cameo appearance of Eddie Constantine near the end (one of several famous actors of the 50s / 60s RWF dug up for the occasion). But the whole premise of the film - very Matrix - is fascinating, and the decor (it was shot in Paris, at a time when the city was going totally futurist with its architecture) stunning. Any serious Fassbinder fan ought to check it out pronto.

[Dan Warburton]

On the subject, has anyone out there read the Daniel Galouye book Simulacron 3 which this is based on? I'm not a great SF reader, was wondering whether it was really worth a pop.

[Dan Warburton]

Baz Luhrmann, Romeo + Juliet, 1996

Can't say the acting impressed me much - Harold Perrineau's drug-stoked cross-dressing Mercutio is rather impressive, but the less said about Paul Sorvino's ridiculous fake dumb Latin macho accent the better (oh yes, Di Caprio and Danes.. well, they have their moments, yet..) - and the Nellee Hooper / Craig Armstrong-saturated terminally hip soundtrack now sounds older than Shakespeare's language, but this snazzy update of R&J takes enormous risks and manages to pull many of them off. You're asking for trouble trying to bring Romeo into the modern world, especially after West Side Story, but hats off to Baz for having a crack at it.

[Dan Warburton]

John Schlesinger, The Falcon and the Snowman, 1985

If you didn't know this was a true story, you'd probably dismiss it out of hand - and even knowing it is, a few details seem wildly improbable (did they really use the paper shredder to crush ice for their margaritas? did spies in Mexico really communicate with the Soviet Embassy by taping a cross onto a lamppost with Scotch tape?), but Hutton's nicely understated performance, contrasting with Sean Penn's near-hysterical rich boy drug dealer complete with little douchey moustache makes it work rather well. Even so, although the film is set in Ford/Nixon times, it wasn't made until the mid 80s, by which time the Great Age of Paranoid Thrillers was over (Parallax View, Conversation, Night Moves, Condor etc etc). So we get a Pat Metheny soundtrack instead - thankfully not much of it though.

[Dan Warburton]

Leos Carax, Pola X, 1998

Haven't read the Melville novel on which this is based - Pierre ou les Ambiguités, to give it its French title, hence "P.O.L.A.", geddit? - but Carax seems to be following it quite closely (won't spoil the plot for you, go Google). The "X" refers apparently to the tenth draft of the script, though I suppose it could also point to the brief but explicit sex scene that so scandalised the poor dears at Cannes back in 98. Either that or they were miffed at seeing Catherine Deneuve topless. As Pierre continues his inexorable decline (great performance from the late Guillaume Depardieu), so does the film.. despite some amazing scenes (the arrival in the.. what is it, a disused warehouse? full of Neubaten lookalikes rehearsing a bombastic percussion piece by Scott Walker..) one's left wondering whether Carax was writing his own story as much as that of his doomed protagonist.

[Dan Warburton]

Beginning to look like a one-man thread



Jacques Audiard, Un Prophète, 2008

The marketing gurus who plastered the DVD box with "Scarface meets The Godfather" in a cynical move to shift product ought to be locked up in the prison Audiard portrays so bleakly and brutally. Outstanding film, just make sure you get English subtitles on your copy.. even Marie (French, of course) had a tough time with the Corsican patois, Arabic and verlan (reverse slang).

[jon abbey]

Beginning to look like a one-man thread

yeah, leroysghost is in NYC for a while, attending all 15 nights of AMPLIFY (!!!), so you're on your own for a bit.

hope you keep the posts here coming, though, I enjoy them...

[Wombatz]

Less enjoyable:

We’ve recently watched Murnau’s City Girl, which combines all the bad potential of his Sunrise and Sjostrom’s The Wind. Stern backwoods morality loses a shootout to sirupy Hollywood convention (but wins the subtext, since the couple still belong to a superficially reformed daddy). The whole thing trundles along expertly though.

Then I’ve attempted to watch Once upon a Time in the West, which tries hard to anticipate the good parts of 1900 and They Call Me Trinity and fails miserably. It’s like bowing a cymbal for laughs? I don’t at all get the appeal.

[Gaendaal]

Beginning to look like a one-man thread



Jacques Audiard, Un Prophète, 2008

The marketing gurus who plastered the DVD box with "Scarface meets The Godfather" in a cynical move to shift product ought to be locked up in the prison Audiard portrays so bleakly and brutally. Outstanding film, just make sure you get English subtitles on your copy.. even Marie (French, of course) had a tough time with the Corsican patois, Arabic and verlan (reverse slang).

Liked this a lot but I thought it could have done without the out-of-place visions that came from time to time.

[Dan Warburton]

Beginning to look like a one-man thread



Jacques Audiard, Un Prophète, 2008

The marketing gurus who plastered the DVD box with "Scarface meets The Godfather" in a cynical move to shift product ought to be locked up in the prison Audiard portrays so bleakly and brutally. Outstanding film, just make sure you get English subtitles on your copy.. even Marie (French, of course) had a tough time with the Corsican patois, Arabic and verlan (reverse slang).

Liked this a lot but I thought it could have done without the out-of-place visions that came from time to time.

SPOILERS Are you referring to the premonition dream of the deer or the reappearance of (the ghost of) Reyeb, the guy he killed? I'm not sure I understood the significance of the former (other than an image of Malik's "taking his future into his own hands" - it's after that trip to Marseille that he gets things going his way), but would argue that the latter are essential. Once Malik comes to terms with what he's done, and admits the murder, Reyeb symbolically disappears, in flames.
No, if there's one thing I was rather underwhelmed with, it was the "happy" ending. As if he's just going to walk out of jail and hop straight into bed with his ex-pal's lady and take over the father role. Also hated the Jimmie Dale Gilmore cover version of "Mack the Knife" over the closing credits.

[Gaendaal]

SPOILERS the reappearance of (the ghost of) Reyeb, the guy he killed? ... Once Malik comes to terms with what he's done, and admits the murder, Reyeb symbolically disappears, in flames.

Which is, perhaps, what I disliked about it. The whole 'now I am absolved' schtick seemed to add unnecessary mysticism, for me.

[Dan Warburton]

Haha, ya forgot to quote the bracket ending the colours bit, so you've spoilt it for everyone heh heh..
See what you mean, but I don't think "absolved " is the word I was thinking of. Anyway, as I said above, the ending is a bit limp, I find. I was rather expecting him to be gunned down.. maybe there's a sequel in the works

[leroysghost]

Then I’ve attempted to watch Once upon a Time in the West, which tries hard to anticipate the good parts of 1900 and They Call Me Trinity and fails miserably. It’s like bowing a cymbal for laughs? I don’t at all get the appeal.

1900 had good parts?

Spot on as far as City Girl is concerned however.

[grisha]

Then I’ve attempted to watch Once upon a Time in the West, which tries hard to anticipate the good parts of 1900 and They Call Me Trinity and fails miserably. It’s like bowing a cymbal for laughs? I don’t at all get the appeal.

my favourite movie of all time.

[Dan Warburton]

Pedro Almodóvar, La mala educación, 2004

Typically convoluted mise en abyme cross-dressing melodramatic fun and games - heavily influenced by Vertigo, I'd say, and that's as far as I dare go on trying to summarise the plot - with a truly sensational performance, or rather performances, from Gael Garcia Bernal as Juan / Angel / Zahara. The Catholic Church in Spain must have loved this one

[Lao Tsu Ben]

Beginning to look like a one-man thread



Jacques Audiard, Un Prophète, 2008

The marketing gurus who plastered the DVD box with "Scarface meets The Godfather" in a cynical move to shift product ought to be locked up in the prison Audiard portrays so bleakly and brutally. Outstanding film, just make sure you get English subtitles on your copy.. even Marie (French, of course) had a tough time with the Corsican patois, Arabic and verlan (reverse slang).

you might also get tired of watching films. I know it does happen sometimes.

[Dan Warburton]

you might also get tired of watching films. I know it does happen sometimes.

Sure. When I met Marie (roughly about the time the first Polwechsel album appeared, fwiw) I bragged stupidly that I preferred to listen to as many albums as possible and watch about 20 films over and over for the rest of my life. Still got the list somewhere. Now I'd say the opposite is more likely