Recently Watched Films 2015

[Dan Warburton]

David Maysles / Albert Maysles /Charlotte Zwerin, Gimme Shelter, 1970

The Sixties end.. right here, as Alan Passaro brings the knife down on Meredith Hunter. Awesome documentary footage (I see a young George Lucas was one of the cameraman, though none of his images actually made it to the final film) - and the final freeze-frame on Jagger followed by the hordes of stoned youngsters parading nowhere is a great way to go out. It's a shame 16mm cameras and the Maysles weren't around to catch the world premiere of The Rite of Spring, but we can rejoice they were there at the Altamont Speedway on December 6th 1969.

[Dan Warburton]

Otto Preminger, The Man With The Golden Arm, 1955

It had trouble from those holier-than-thou idiots working for the PCA, but did well at the box office and got Sinatra a Best Actor nomination (personally, I would have preferred John Garfield, who I believe was originally slated to play Frankie), and is still remarkable for its graphic - at the time - portrayal of heroin addiction, not to mention the fact that the junkie is the hero of the film. Even so, the (nearly) happy ending, where Frankie gets the monkey off his back all alone going cold turkey in Kim Novak's bedroom (would that it were so simple in real life..) and Eleanor Baxter is obviously guilty because she was faking it all along etc etc (the cop says bugger all and Sinatra just wanders off) is a bit of a disappointment. In the Nelson Algren original Frankie kills not only his pusher but also himself, and his gal Molly becomes a hooker. No way could someone as nice as Kim Novak as she is here ever do that. More odd trivia for ya: if you're a Barry Adamson fan you might recognise the theme tune, which he covered on Moss Side Story.

[SqDanceCallingSteve]

THE BIG SHORT (2015) -- Entertaining, funny and educational movie about the housing bubble, credit default swaps, collateralized debt obligations, synthetic collateralized debt obligations and all the other schemes to perpetuate the fraud that cost the economy trillions of dollars, and millions of houses and jobs lost. The movie focuses on the first few traders to figure out that the housing market would burst, men who sold short on mortgage bonds and made fortunes. Selena Gomez, Anthony Bourdain, and others explain some of the technical economic concepts in entertaining little vignettes. Enlightening and fun, and honest enough to leave the viewer righteously pissed off at the system.

[dialectics of shit]

Raoul Ruiz, Klimt, 2005

Malkovich tends to come in for some flak online, but his laidback, laconic delivery works well here - of course, the pack of idiots over at IMDb moaning that this was not a "real biopic" (what is a "real biopic"?) know very little either of the aesthetics of Gustav Klimt or the cinema of Raoul Ruiz.. sure, perhaps the longer Director's Cut (which I have yet to see) explains a few more details, but I'm inclined to doubt it. The wild camera movements, elliptical script, multiplication of characters and difficulty on the part of both viewer and director to determine whether they're "real" or "imagined" all adds to the fun. A rich, rewarding experience, both sensually (irrationally?) and intellectually (rationally)

I agree with all of this. So many people seemed to have missed the point with this film. Or, rather, tried to force a point upon it.

[SqDanceCallingSteve]

STAR WARS -- THE FORCE AWAKENS (2015) -- I loved it! Thought it was great entertainment, nonstop action, engaging plot, great to look at, some of the planetary landscapes were extraordinary. My wife thought it was just OK, another loud action movie. Our son, who has a degree in computer graphics, was disappointed in the visuals, thought the CGI was nothing new and the practical effects were not up to snuff.

[Lao Tsu Ben]

Raoul Ruiz, Klimt, 2005

One of the few biopics that did something for me precisely because... Glad some people like it!

[walto]

Some raunch--Ted 2 and Spy (unrated), and some odd psychology and AI musings--Her.

[Dan Warburton]

Jean-Marie Poiré, Le père Noël est une ordure, 1982

I don't think you need to be French to appreciate this, but I imagine it helps (that said, the English subs that accompany the KG rip are pretty good). Whatever, this is one of those films that everyone in France has seen at some stage, or at least claims to have – and its potty, very un-PC humour can travel better than other French cult comedies.

[Dan Warburton]

Peter Strickland, Berberian Sound Studio, 2012

Ha, nice to see my old pal Belgian free improv vocalist Jean-Michel van Schouwburg (below) in action as the evil goblin.. With half of Nurse With Wound on board in some form or another, this is probably the kind of thing that might appeal to punters here. I have to say I found the self-effacing Toby Jones (above) a bit hard to take - you wish he'd just stop wimping out and tell the greasy guineas (don't edit post please mods, I'm being deliberately insulting) to fuckoff – but I guess he has to be soft (in the head too, perhaps) to find himself dragged into doing foley work for a sleazy giallo. Nice how the whole thing falls apart. Don't expect answers – questions are much more interesting.

[Dan Warburton]

Bertrand Tavernier, Quai d'Orsay, 2013

This time (see two posts ago), you really do have to be French – or have a good working knowledge of the French political scene – to get the most out of Tavernier's tight, snappy pisstake. Thierry Lhermitte, as Alexandre Taillard de Worms (!), a hilarious cross between Chirac, Sarkozy and Dominique de Villepin (whose speech to the UN against intervention in Iraq did indeed provoke a round of applause), is splendid (pun deliberate). So is Nils Arestrup, playing Sir Humphrey to Lhermitte's hyperactive minister. I guess some kind of crappy sentimental transatlantic remake could be made, though I hope nobody ever does it. Like Yes Minister and Yes Prime Minister, some things are best left in their country of origin. But as an indication of how close this is to real life, the young lady in the picture above is Julie Gayet, François Hollande's love interest

[Dan Warburton]

Aki Kaurismäki, Drifting Clouds,1996

In addition to the pic above, there are plenty of nuggets of info on offer where I got it from http://www.jonathanrosenbaum.net/1998/0 ... -the-edge/ - I was just wondering if the director knew the famous Fawlty Towers episode "Gourmet Night", which also features a drunken chef. Whatever, this is one Kaurismäki film that has a happy ending. Well, I think it does..

[Dan Warburton]

Nicolas Winding Refn, Fear X (aka "Inside Job"), 2003

I prefer "Inside Job" to the bland "Fear X" (shades of Pola X?) myself, but it unfortunately gives the game away, so forget I said that. Most comments I've read on Refn's US debut make the same point though: what starts out well ends up as rather banal, assuming that Harry really does kill Peter and the latter's death is hushed up as effectively as Harry's wife's was. BUT are we supposed to take that as read, or are there other unanswered questions that the movie doesn't (want to) resolve? I suspect there might be (like, what was she doing in that apartment opposite his, anyway?), and as the film is very Lynch-inspired - Eraserhead hotels complete with lonely hookers, Lost Highway grainy videotapes, and Twin Peaks red drapes galore - I fancy the director wanted to leave things a little more open. However, in so doing, he duly incurred the wrath of the mainstream IQ50 moviegoers and his smart new production company went under as a result. It's pretty slow, and there's precious little dialogue to get in the way of the spacey Eno soundtrack (and what little there is isn't at all memorable). Worth a look, if only for Turturro and Remar's performances.
http://www.thepinksmoke.com/historyfearx.htm if you have an hour to kill

[Dan Warburton]

Nicolas Winding Refn, Valhalla Rising, 2009

That's Mads Mikkelsen turning a blind eye, in a fine non-speaking performance as One Eye, or Odin, or whoever you want to read him as in this gorgeously shot, pretentious-and-proud-of-it allegorical tale, a sort of cross between Malick's The New World (beamed back to the days of Eiríkr Þorvaldsson aka Erik the Red) and Herzog's Aguirre Wrath of God with muddy, bloody wrestling scenes thrown in for good measure. Makes you feel like going to Scotland on holiday - though not at the moment, looking at the weather forecast today

[Antoine]

Bertrand Tavernier, Quai d'Orsay, 2013

This time (see two posts ago), you really do have to be French – or have a good working knowledge of the French political scene – to get the most out of Tavernier's tight, snappy pisstake. Thierry Lhermitte, as Alexandre Taillard de Worms (!), a hilarious cross between Chirac, Sarkozy and Dominique de Villepin (whose speech to the UN against intervention in Iraq did indeed provoke a round of applause), is splendid (pun deliberate). So is Nils Arestrup, playing Sir Humphrey to Lhermitte's hyperactive minister. I guess some kind of crappy sentimental transatlantic remake could be made, though I hope nobody ever does it. Like Yes Minister and Yes Prime Minister, some things are best left in their country of origin. But as an indication of how close this is to real life, the young lady in the picture above is Julie Gayet, François Hollande's love interest

If you haven't read the comics yet... they're really nice & fun (especially the 2nd one).

[Dan Warburton]

Thanks for the tip, Antoine - I'll treat myself to a late Christmas present -- bonne année à toi

[Antoine]

also, about the co-author of the comics / movie, Antonin Baudry aka Abel Lanzac (the ex speech writer of Villepin):
http://www.franceculture.fr/emission-ho ... 2015-03-06
(he quits his new job a couple of months later)

[Piano Mouth]

Lao Tsu Ben,

What other Matsumoto films do you recommend? Also, can you tell me some more of the traditional robot/giant monster battle films from Japan???