Recently Watched Films 2019

[Dan Warburton]

Mads Brügger, The Saint Bernard Syndicate, 2018

It's had mixed reviews, but we thoroughly enjoyed this wacky tale of two Danish businessmen (not very successful ones, either) who try to sell Saint Bernard puppies to the burgeoning Chinese middle class. Needless to say it doesn't exactly go according to plan, but I won't spoil the ending for you. "Lost In Translation" would be an excellent alternative title - but that's already been done

[surfer]

The Lighthouse (Eggers, 2019)

I loved everything about this from the claustrophic gray 4:3 ratio, to the glistening sensuous cinematography, to the cacophonous sound design that feels like a sensory assault. Too bad they havent perfected Smell-o-vision. The titanic farting Dafoe really chews the scenery in a few monologues to hilarious effect, and Pattinson plays it more straight as a quiet man driven to alcoholism and madness. The cinematography and unrelenting tension reminded me of Clouzot's Wages of Fear. The seagull deserves an Oscar. Great finish.

I am much more likely to think about these performances and remember certain images from The Lighthouse, than the other highly stylized arthouse horror Midsommar, which it resembles in many respects, but in others its 180 degrees from.

[henriq]

Takashi Miike, Rainy Dog, 1997

Good solid yakuza flick, the second part of the Black Society trilogy (but don't worry, you don't need to have seen the first one to dig this). And, yes, I haven't seen as much rain in a film since Se7en

You're probably on your way there already, but check ot Ley Lines too, I think that's the best of that series.

[henriq]

Jon Jost, Bell Diamond, 1986

To quote from https://www.jonathanrosenbaum.net/2018/ ... e-realism/ : "A constructed realism that remains open to accident, and seems founded on a distanced respect for unexceptional characters, it is a handcrafted movie that won’t find many viewers in a universe of shopping malls. To represent such an art in a few words and pictures is no easy matter; certainly the beauty and originality of Jost’s camera style are inadequately served by the grainy still that accompanies this review. To wrestle with it on the screen is not always a picnic either. But unless or until this kind of filmmaking is ground underfoot entirely by high-priced fantasies that cost many thousand times as much, Jost’s cinema will convey truths about this country that won’t readily be found elsewhere." Word. A magnificent film, look forward to hearing your take on it too, Henrik.

Well, like you said, magnificent, magnificent and a half. Like mr Rosenbaum, really at a loss for words: how do you write in a linear fashion about something as fluently complex as this? In fact, American coordinates be damned: this is the Eric Rohmer of Les rendez-vous de Paris (the segment around the Picasso museum and the awesome stretch here in the friend’s apartment); the Alain Cavalier of the minor essay films or even something major, and gorgeous, like Martin et Lea. Bodies and language tracked and written within the frame, but then, with a supreme lack of effort, lifted and massaged into a sort of distended, cubist portraiture. The sequence set in the deserted industrial quarry: I don’t know anyone who does that, just some guys walking and talking and then opening up into vistas of politics, memory, trauma. Or something as elemental as Jost’s framing: dictated as much by economical and physical constraints as by aesthetics or ideology (how much can you actually move around in a trailer?), faces and bodies always slightly off centre, too close or far away from the camera, tumbling into or out of the frame. Limits and boundaries accentuated, amplified through videographic trickery (the great opening with the baseball game on the tv), through sound - here as elsewhere, the director has an awesome ear - another level or depth of writing and commentary introduced. It reminds of the American writer and filmmaker William E. Jones: check his biography about William Halsted, Halsted Plays Himself, or his writing on Werner Schroeter, Boyd McDonald, on Christian iconography, and find an ostensible line of argument and thought opening up into disquisitions on politics, class struggle at MOMA NY, Arab love poetry and etymology, Robert Burton’s Anatomy of Melancholy, sex and pornography. A beauty to read too: facsimiles of the writings discussed will suddenly appear on the page, unannounced, an even further limbering and democratisation of the authorial voice and ego. And, back on point re Jost: to move from mumblecore to dialectics and back - quite unique in the history of cinema, wouldn’t you say?

[Dan Warburton]

Ah my dear friend, no need to remind me yet again of the millions of things I haven't read, and probably won't ever have time to read! I suspect if I ever have 24 hours totally free, I'm more likely to spend them watching each Jost film five times each than read I'm always tempted to say "a spanking new DVD remaster would be great" but I wonder if that would be possible, even desirable with Jost. It's like those old Sun Ra Saturn LPs - the shitty pressings are part of the magic.

[henriq]

Ah my dear friend, no need to remind me yet again of the millions of things I haven't read, and probably won't ever have time to read! I suspect if I ever have 24 hours totally free, I'm more likely to spend them watching each Jost film five times each than read I'm always tempted to say "a spanking new DVD remaster would be great" but I wonder if that would be possible, even desirable with Jost. It's like those old Sun Ra Saturn LPs - the shitty pressings are part of the magic.

Well, in that case, see what you think about The Bed You Sleep In or Angel City? To each his own re reading - that's where my fancy took me. That Cage quote of yours, If the mind wanders, let it? And if it will entice you, Jones is eminently readable, and slim in volume. Or check out his Tearoom, it's on KG. Not exactly SFW though, or trainride.

And, I have a sneaking suspicion that the KG rips are culled from the DVDs Jost puts out himself, probably lo-fi and grainy to begin with. All that money not spent has to come out of something, right? No matter, magic stuff, as you say.

[Dan Warburton]

magic stuff, as you say.

You want magic? Try this --



Don Askarian, Komitas, 1989

If you don't know anything about Soghomon Soghomonian, aka Father Komitas, DON'T read the Wiki page https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Komitas
or my (coloured) spoilers before you watch this amazingly beautiful film. You can, however, check out this awesome sequence:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bJSvVKwuKeE
Film as poetry - Pasolini would have been proud. If, like me, you're one of those folks who thrills to those extended tracking shots in Tarkovsky of objects underwater, or goes into raptures watching The Colour of Pomegranates, you can't afford to miss this. Askarian sets up some truly staggering shots - you can piece together the basic historical facts of the story (Komitas was so traumatised by the Armenian genocide that he abandoned music altogether and ended up in the same psychiatric hospital as Artaud in Villejuif, just south of Paris), but that's not what this is all about: it's a supremely moving work of cinema, and I have no hesitation in rating it as high as I would Stalker or Sayat Nova. A superb 1080 rip is over at KG, treat yourself.

[henriq]

Peter Weir - Picnic at Hanging Rock (1975)

Not at all impressed by this. Sure, technically you could say it’s flawless - great casting, direction, cinematography - but the symbolism is so heavy-handed it’s silly. There is, I suppose, a thinking elaborated around schooling and colonialism, all those white dresses and corsets shaping and carrying a cadre/community of good subjects - and the darker hues in clothing will tend towards madness, death, whatever. But the coding is Young Adult, and there is a tidy prettiness to proceedings telegraphed all over the place. Compare the creampuff of this to the still awesome realist punch of Schepisi’s The Chant of Jimmie Blacksmith, released almost concurrently with Weir’s film. Awful music too.

[henriq]

and speaking of pretty, this:



John Ford - The Fugitive (1947)

I don’t usually write these capsules or pass judgment after only having watched five minutes of a film, but here I feel confident in my disdain. Graham Greene? Sure, and John Ford is supposed to be great, but in the first five minutes, before the opening credits are even over, you see Henry Fonda stumbling into a church, his arms outstretched across the frame of the door, a perfect cross-shaped figure against the light. And in the church, he passes benediction on a madonna-like peasant with a child in her arms. Nope, it’s probably not gonna let up. In fact, I’ll let David Thomson do my sneering for me: this, on DP Gabriel Figueroa, is spot on: “He had pronounced ideas of beauty and the rather glamorous portrayal of poverty. ‘His work was full of filtered clouds and peasant madonnas, their heads covered with rebozos. There was sure to be a scene in each of his films where fifty of those creatures would be standing in a clump, holding burning candles.’ That is Elia Kazan […] The florid Figueroa was also too evident […] the quite ghastly The Fugitive (47, John Ford), for which Ford seems to have been a complacent onlooker.” This I read before having a look at Ford’s film, and just think, all the coordinates of that magnificent slaying acted out in the first five minutes. Thank you, I won’t. But please, prove me wrong if I need it.

[Dan Warburton]

Peter Weir - Picnic at Hanging Rock (1975)
Not at all impressed by this. Sure, technically you could say it’s flawless - great casting, direction, cinematography - but the symbolism is so heavy-handed it’s silly.

Isn't that part of the fun?

There is, I suppose, a thinking elaborated around schooling and colonialism, all those white dresses and corsets shaping and carrying a cadre/community of good subjects - and the darker hues in clothing will tend towards madness, death, whatever.

Goodness knows what's it's supposed to be about - I doubt the director knows

But the coding is Young Adult, and there is a tidy prettiness to proceedings telegraphed all over the place.

Remind me to buy you a book of David Hamilton photos for Christmas.

Compare the creampuff of this to the still awesome realist punch of Schepisi’s The Chant of Jimmie Blacksmith, released almost concurrently with Weir’s film. Awful music too.

Ah, still have to get to Jimmie Blacksmith.. But have you seen The Cars that ate Paris and The Plumber, talking of Weir?

and speaking of pretty, this:



John Ford - The Fugitive (1947)

I don’t usually write these capsules or pass judgment after only having watched five minutes of a film, but here I feel confident in my disdain. Graham Greene? Sure, and John Ford is supposed to be great, but in the first five minutes, before the opening credits are even over, you see Henry Fonda stumbling into a church, his arms outstretched across the frame of the door, a perfect cross-shaped figure against the light. And in the church, he passes benediction on a madonna-like peasant with a child in her arms. Nope, it’s probably not gonna let up. In fact, I’ll let David Thomson do my sneering for me: this, on DP Gabriel Figueroa, is spot on: “He had pronounced ideas of beauty and the rather glamorous portrayal of poverty. ‘His work was full of filtered clouds and peasant madonnas, their heads covered with rebozos. There was sure to be a scene in each of his films where fifty of those creatures would be standing in a clump, holding burning candles.’ That is Elia Kazan […] The florid Figueroa was also too evident […] the quite ghastly The Fugitive (47, John Ford), for which Ford seems to have been a complacent onlooker.” This I read before having a look at Ford’s film, and just think, all the coordinates of that magnificent slaying acted out in the first five minutes. Thank you, I won’t. But please, prove me wrong if I need it.

Funny coincidence that I'm just scribbling about a film directed by both Elia Kazan and John Ford - though the latter pulled out, objecting to the casting of Jeanne Crain as the (very) light-skinned Negro heroine. I think he was wrong - and Crain's Oscar nomination would seem to indicate others agree with me - Crain's rather cold distance works well in what could all too easily have descended into the maudlin. Solid performances from a pair of Ethels - Waters and Barrymore - as, respectively, Pinky's washerwoman grandma, and Miss Em, the ailing lady of the manor, who eventually warms sufficiently to Pinky to bequeath her the house, setting up the courtroom drama of the last quarter hour. On the subject of Ford, I've never quite understood the man's mythic status - sure, there are some great films (Stagecoach, My Darling Clementine, Rio Grande, The Searchers..) but a lot of gooey dross too (Tobacco Road, How Green Was My Valley, The Quiet Man..). Haven't seen The Fugitive, though. As for Figueroa, I have no problem with his work on Los Olvidados.



Elia Kazan, Pinky, 1949

[henriq]

Isn't that part of the fun?

Hey, don't ask me to be consistent.

There is, I suppose, a thinking elaborated around schooling and colonialism, all those white dresses and corsets shaping and carrying a cadre/community of good subjects - and the darker hues in clothing will tend towards madness, death, whatever.

Goodness knows what's it's supposed to be about - I doubt the director knows

Not a consistent thematic either, seeing as the girls going missing are all dressed in white, but the teacher going missing is dressed in darkest crimson, the head teacher always dressed in black, well you've seen the film.

Remind me to buy you a book of David Hamilton photos for Christmas.

Oh dear, I can only imagine...

Ah, still have to get to Jimmie Blacksmith.. But have you seen The Cars that ate Paris and The Plumber, talking of Weir?

And I have yet to write about it. Gaah... Backlog, as I said. Haven't seen the others, but I like The Last Wave, and if I can look past Harrison Ford, I think I kind of like Witness too.

On the subject of Ford, I've never quite understood the man's mythic status - sure, there are some great films (Stagecoach, My Darling Clementine, Rio Grande, The Searchers..) but a lot of gooey dross too (Tobacco Road, How Green Was My Valley, The Quiet Man..). Haven't seen The Fugitive, though. As for Figueroa, I have no problem with his work on Los Olvidados.

You know, I've tried several times to like The Searchers, but no dice. Probably poisoned from my uni days, you had to like it, the pathology shining through, the formalism and abstraction, Taxi Driver a remake and so on. I should give it a new chance. Re Figueroa, the thrust of Thomson's entry is that Buñuel managed to rein him in, and Ford didn't. So, you'll take one for the team, watch The Fugitive and tell me if I'm wrong?

[Mo Noyz]

The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance is one of the most underrated Westerns of all time, IMO. Ford at his very best.

[Dan Warburton]

The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance is one of the most underrated Westerns of all time, IMO. Ford at his very best.

I'd forgotten that, yes - very fine. But do you really think it's underrated?

[Mo Noyz]

I actually do, but I probably like it more than most. Granted, I’m not a movie aficionado like yourself and Henrique.

[Dan Warburton]

Vincente Minnelli, Meet Me In St Louis, 1944

Probably worth two minutes of your time if only to check out the hairstyles, but other than that I can't think of any justifiable reason for watching this fluffy kitsch - it's not even a real musical, with only about three half-decent songs. Don't know why I bothered myself, to be frank.

[Dan Warburton]

Olivier Assayas, Fin août, début septembre, 1999

"Adrien (François Cluzet), a writer who has had only marginal commercial success, discovers that he is dying and tells his friend Gabriel (Mathieu Amalric), with whom he has had a tumultuous relationship. Gabriel tries to attend to his friend while making sense of his complicated romantic life, torn between dependable Jenny (Jeanne Balibar) and volatile Anne (Virginie Ledoyen). Meanwhile, other friends of Adrien struggle to assess their lives and careers in the wake of his revelation." Fine performances all round, well done and all that, but nothing truly exceptional

[Dan Warburton]

David Lean, Hobson's Choice, 1954

Eh up lad, if tha's lookin' for someone to chew t' scenery, tha can't do better than Charles Laughton. Even if he did come from Scarborough, enemy territory, instead of Salford, where this was filmed (Peel Park looked gorgeous back then). Watch out for a young Sybil Fawlty (Prunella Scales) too. https://seeingthingssecondhand.wordpres ... oice-1954/

[Dan Warburton]

Jean-Jacques Beineix, La lune dans le caniveau, 1983

Perhaps the most surprising thing about this is how closely it seems to adhere to the David Goodis novel that inspired it, the tale of a docker obsessed by the rape / suicide of his sister who gets involved with the beautiful rich sister of one of the characters who hangs out in the filthy dive he goes drinking in. Shot in Cinecittà - which explains its Fellini sheen - and starring Gérard Depardieu as, umm, Gérard and Nastassia Kinski as Loretta, Beineix's second feature, sandwiched between Diva and 37.2° le matin, wasn't a success, either with the public or the critics, and it's not hard to see why - it's a curious mix of glitzy arty cinematography and crass, vulgar dialogue. I might try it again someday if I can find a decent rip - it needs one - but I think I'd prefer to rewatch Diva, or an early Carax.

[Dan Warburton]

Arthur Penn, Mickey One, 1965

http://www.cineoutsider.com/reviews/blu ... ne_br.html "Mickey One is a pretty fantastic viewing experience wrapped in a superbly uneven movie. It's an oddity in the best sense, and the overlap of interest should be significant. Warren Beatty fans, obviously, need to take a peek. Those who appreciate the cinema of the French New Wave, too, must find time to give it a chance. What really sets the movie apart is just how different it is from its ostensible peers. Penn made nothing else like it and neither did Beatty. One could even say Columbia Pictures made nothing else like it. Strictly on feel it gives off a similar effect as something like John Frankenheimer's Seconds - a movie that you can hardly believe exists even as you watch it. The sheer exhilaration might not be exactly comparable but they're both precious unicorns in the studio system landscape." Indeed they are: this is a real find, well worth checking out, as is the above-linked review. Trailer here: https://alchetron.com/Mickey-One "Guilty of not being innocent", a great line - Pynchon would love that. Check it out!

[Dan Warburton]

Gillo Pontecorvo, Kapo, 1961

This must be one of the few films where something that was written about it has ended up far more famous than the film itself. Jacques Rivette's De l'abjection, which took the director to task for staging Emmanuelle Riva's suicide running into an electric fence, was along with Truffaut's Une certaine tendance one of the flagship Cahiers du Cinéma polemical texts. The article is well worth a read in its entirety (it's not long, but it's in French but cut up in bits and sent to DeepL you'll get a good idea:
http://simpleappareil.free.fr/lobservat ... es-rivette). The sentence on the infamous tracking shot translates as follows: "However, see in Kapo, the plan in which Riva committed suicide by throwing himself on the electrified barbed wire; the man who decided, at that moment, to make a forward trip to reframe the corpse below, taking care to inscribe exactly the raised hand in an angle of his final body, this man was entitled only to the most profound contempt." Yeouch! For Serge Daney, this was enough to decide his vocation as a film critic
http://www.pileface.com/sollers/IMG/pdf ... 0Daney.pdf - without having seen the film, he admits. Antoine de Baecque has a more balanced take on the controversy, methinks https://www.cairn.info/revue-revue-d-hi ... ge-211.htm# The offending moment is here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Z692pXSDBM
So.. what's all the fuss about? It's perhaps an indication of how comfortably numb / dumb we've all become in recent times, post-Schindler's List and whatnot, but Rivette was, I think, on the right track extolling the virtues of Resnais' Nuit et brouillard. Whether that film should have been compared to Pontecorvo's is an interesting question in its own right, but not one I feel like discussing here, though am happy to do so if anyone out there wants to take up the gauntlet.. I do think, though, that any discussion thereof should begin from the a position of having seen Kapo all the way through. Which I've just done. Curiously, after having been blown away by his The Battle of Algiers, I found this one rather.. underwhelming. To be what extent that's due to Susan Strasberg (yes, daughter of Lee) I'm not sure. Pontecorvo's point that the oppressed are capable of being / becoming the oppressors certainly resonates these days, not least in the soul-searching going on in the British Labour Party right now over the anti-semiticism issue, but Edith's (Nicole's) last-minute self-sacrifice and deathbed intonation of Jewish scriptures seems a bit twee. Oddly enough, the final massacre recalls Peckinpah's Wild Bunch - and also the final wonderful exchange of Straw Dogs:
"I don't know my way home." "That's OK. I don't either." Dunno, have a look, see what you think, cinéphiles.