Recently Watched Films 2018

[Dan Warburton]

Guy Maddin / Evan Johnson / Galen Johnson, The Green Fog, 2017

A virtuoso montage of films and TV series old and new all shot in or around San Francisco (I love stuff like this) which retells the story of Hitch's Vertigo - very entertaining, often hilarious (love the way they edit out most of the stupid dialogue) and if you want to play Spot The Movie the end credits list all the sourced sampled. Great fun!
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/01/04/movi ... cisco.html

[walto]

Speaking of Hitchcock, since I'm rereading Conrad's Secret Agent I recently rewatched as much of the Hitch movie based on it (Sabotage, not Secret Agent) as I could stand. Terrible--he really hadn't found his stride yet. Fortunately, the relationship with the Conrad work is pretty loose. Some of the same character names are used, and there's a terrorist bombing and a half-wit brother; but that's about it.

[Piano Mouth]

somebody who I don't know gave me a bunch of karagarga points a couple weeks ago, lifting me off of probation so I took the advantage and saw:

Ceylan - Winter's sleep



Was floored by this film, at nearly 3.5 hours long it wasn't at least boring and was insanely good for something where nothing blows up or no gun fights (I've been hanging out with my roommate a bit more because he's been smoking me up and all he plays is violent first person shooter video games eck). Talks about class structure and arrogance among a Turkish landlord and his tenants who can't pay rent. The sound editing is quite impeccable, I haven't heard a film sound this good in awhile. There are also a few twists and surprises in the film that keep it going at full steam. Worth the long watch if you've got the time.

Kiyoshi Kurosawa - Journey to the Shore



Another classic, (my back to back viewing was so good this time around!), an intertwining, non linear story about a piano teacher and ghosts around her including her ghost husband. I missed Kiyoshi's newest film that was playing for a week in the theater so I thought I'd catch up on some of his older films until I get the chance to peep Before We Vanish. This one is one of his better films and is just a dandy of a flick. A huge success in filmmaking

[Dan Warburton]

Speaking of Hitchcock, since I'm rereading Conrad's Secret Agent I recently rewatched as much of the Hitch movie based on it (Sabotage, not Secret Agent) as I could stand. Terrible--he really hadn't found his stride yet. Fortunately, the relationship with the Conrad work is pretty loose. Some of the same character names are used, and there's a terrorist bombing and a half-wit brother; but that's about it.

The book's better, of course (with Conrad that's always the case), but I think you're being a little hard on the film.. I like Oskar Homolka's Verloc very much, and Sylvia Sidney was so impressed by Hitch's directing of the scene with the knife that she pushed hard for him to be lured to the States. And of course Tarantino swiped the scene with the kid and the exploding film canister for Inglourious Basterds. In any case, it's much better than Secret Agent

[Dan Warburton]

Mathieu Amalric, Barbara, 2017

Hm, I wish they'd just played it straight and shot it as a "normal" biopic, as Jeanne Balibar not only looks and (nearly) sounds like the late French singer Barbara (née Monique Andrée Serf, 1930 - 1997), as the frequent intercutting between the two makes abundantly clear - but as the director here is Ms Balibar's ex in real life, we get caught in one of those typically French mise-en-abyme conceits about directors falling in love with their leading ladies. I'm surprised in fact that such a complex and often confusingly arty piece of filmmaking has had such success. Well, here in France at least. You folks probably don't know much about Barbara anyway. Understanding French certainly helps.

[Dan Warburton]

Terrence Malick, Badlands, 1973

I can't believe how good this film is each time I see it, and I can see why so many others ripped it off - the academy award for Most Blatant Soundtrack Theft certainly goes to the execrable Zimmer (in True Romance https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aI4iCx7LnbY) for stealing Carl Orff's Gassenhauer. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-tEgzGnzojc

[Dan Warburton]

Richard Fleischer, Soylent Green, 1973

Yeah, 1973 was a good year. So this was what 2022 looked like back then? Always hilarious to see how earlier generations of dystopian sci-fi directors envisaged the not-too-distant future. I still like this film very much, for all its oddities. I'm not a Heston fan but he's good here, even though it's Edward G. Robinson who steals the show before "going home".

[Dan Warburton]

Alex Cox, Tombstone Rashomon, 2017

Alex "Repo Man" Cox has been a "maverick" (i.e. not to be trusted with Hollywood money under any circumstances) filmmaker ever since Walker, but that hasn't stopped him - this latest crowdfunded (of course) adventure is a Rashomon-style (see above) retelling of the Gunfight at the O.K. Corral story, complete with trademark goofy Cox anachronisms (police cars, for example). Here's the blurb he put out when he started - https://alexcoxfilms.wordpress.com/tombstone-rashomon/ - the fact the film got made shows that many thought it a worthwhile investment. As far as I can see, nobody's reviewed it yet online. Except me! Haha. Well, it was entertaining but a little dry - at barely 80 minutes it doesn't overstay its welcome, though.

[Dan Warburton]

Takashi Miike, Dead or Alive 2 Birds, 2000

Miike's awfully good at frustrating expectations, and I imagine those expecting another shoot'emup yakuza bloodbath were a little taken aback by the (tacky) CGI and the lead characters suddenly sporting wings, Wenders-like. Then again, the opening scene with the deranged magician tearing up cigarette packets and pulling a stream of flags out of his earhole should have put your cat among your pigeons for starters. Potty, but fun, I suppose

[Dan Warburton]

Floyd Mutrux, Aloha, Bobby and Rose, 1975

The press shot it down, but grossing $35m for a measly $60k budget it was a smash hit at the time. If you don't like Elton John don't worry, there's plenty of excellent stuff on the soundtrack besides him - and that '68 Camaro is wayyy cool.

[Dan Warburton]

Guillaume Nicloux, Valley of Love, 2015

Depardieu's never been ashamed of showing his body in movies (even chopping bits of it off.. ah, when will get to see a decent print of Marco Ferreri's The Last Woman?), and there's certainly enough of it to show these days. Here he's shacked up in Death Valley with his ex-wife (Isabelle Huppert) apparently to receive some communication-from-beyond-the-grave with their recently deceased (suicide) son. Ever since Pialat's Loulou, they've always made an odd couple, the beached whale actor and his wiry partner, but despite stunning location shooting and some strange Lynchian cameos (who is that strange deformed blonde who accosts Depardieu?), it never quite hangs together, somehow.

[walto]

Richard Fleischer, Soylent Green, 1973

Yeah, 1973 was a good year. So this was what 2022 looked like back then? Always hilarious to see how earlier generations of dystopian sci-fi directors envisaged the not-too-distant future. I still like this film very much, for all its oddities. I'm not a Heston fan but he's good here, even though it's Edward G. Robinson who steals the show before "going home".

More relevant than ever, actually.

https://twitter.com/RichardDawkins

(And I, too, love Edward G.--in pretty much everything.)

[Wombatz]

eddie g. rules, charlton heston has many more good roles than i'd care to admit, and soylent green is a possible all-time top 10 entry for me.

badlands, otoh, is merely pretty and ruined from the start by the whole silly babes in the woods fairytale killers thing and all their cute meta poses.

[Dan Warburton]

https://twitter.com/RichardDawkins

D'oh, am I being invited to read half a million tweets to find one relevant comment? Sorry Walt, no time for that. But Dawkins is generally OK by me.

badlands, otoh, is merely pretty and ruined from the start by the whole silly babes in the woods fairytale killers thing and all their cute meta poses.

That's just what I love about it. And you know it's coming from the theme music, don't you?

[Wombatz]

And you know it's coming from the theme music, don't you?

it's a 90-minute music video for a carl orff ditty? even i think that's a bit harsh, but i see where you're coming from

[Dan Warburton]

And you know it's coming from the theme music, don't you?

it's a 90-minute music video for a carl orff ditty? even i think that's a bit harsh, but i see where you're coming from

I see that my above sentence is a little ambiguous; what I meant was "you know what you're in for (meaning your "whole silly babes in the woods fairytale") as soon as you hear the opening music." So I should have written "as soon as" instead of "from", apologies.

[Wombatz]

on another note, is there a really good sherlock holmes movie? my older son is on a kick, and he's still an age where he can watch practically anything, but the whole bunch so far was rather underwhelming. i won't mention them all, but the best was probably the hammer hound of the baskervilles with cushing as sherlock and lee as the lord. my favorite sherlock is ian richardson, but the (two?) films themselves are meh (and he takes a long, frustrating leave of absence during his hound). billy wilder's private life is really awful, like everything you don't want in a sherlock story, petticoats and such. can't remember which rathbone we've seen, but he was much too american and energetic. (otoh, i enjoyed the first robert downey sherlock some time ago, while the second one was utter blech. also not a fan of the one cumberbatch episode i started and walked out on. data as sherlock on star trek next generation was one of the few great episodes i seem to remember, we have that on preorder from the library.)

anyway, good or bad, none of these realizes the full potential of sherlock holmes. is there a film which does that?

[Steve Minkin]

on another note, is there a really good sherlock holmes movie? my older son is on a kick, and he's still an age where he can watch practically anything, but the whole bunch so far was rather underwhelming. i won't mention them all, but the best was probably the hammer hound of the baskervilles with cushing as sherlock and lee as the lord. my favorite sherlock is ian richardson, but the (two?) films themselves are meh (and he takes a long, frustrating leave of absence during his hound). billy wilder's private life is really awful, like everything you don't want in a sherlock story, petticoats and such. can't remember which rathbone we've seen, but he was much too american and energetic. (otoh, i enjoyed the first robert downey sherlock some time ago, while the second one was utter blech. also not a fan of the one cumberbatch episode i started and walked out on. data as sherlock on star trek next generation was one of the few great episodes i seem to remember, we have that on preorder from the library.)

anyway, good or bad, none of these realizes the full potential of sherlock holmes. is there a film which does that?

Haven't seen it in over 40 years, but I remember liking The Seven Percent Solution, based on a novel by Nicholas Meyer, with Nicol Williamson as Sherlock Holmes, Robert Duvall as Dr. Watson, Alan Arkin as Dr. Sigmund Freud, and Laurence Olivier as Professor Moriarty.

[walto]

https://twitter.com/RichardDawkins

D'oh, am I being invited to read half a million tweets to find one relevant comment? Sorry Walt, no time for that. But Dawkins is generally OK by me.

Sorry about that. Here you go:

Tissue culture “clean meat” already in 2018? I’ve long been looking forward to this.
https://ind.pn/2F9xAwS
What if human meat is grown? Could we overcome our taboo against cannibalism? An interesting test case for consequentialist morality versus “yuck reaction” absolutism.

[Dan Warburton]

Bo Widerberg, Man on the Roof, 1976

Excellent in every way as far as I'm concerned, but I can see why some people don't care for the drab, middle-aged antihero detectives, or the fact that we soon find out who killed Nyman (what a shame he didn't butcher Glass, Adams and Reich while he was at it, haha), or even the fact that we know - from the title of the film - where the final showdown is played out. On the contrary, the shift in gear from police procedural to action movie is terrifically exciting. Love the ending too, but you can find out about that for yourselves.