Cinema, 2019--The Future Has Arrived

Watched our first film of 2019, Lynne Ramsay's "Ratcatcher".

Powerful and authentic look at lower middle class life in Glasgow in the early 1980s.

Takes no prisoners, never a false moment.

Highly recommended.

Saw Malila: The Farewell Flower by Thai director Anucha Boonyawatana. "A man returns to his old village to care for his ex-boyfriend, who has been diagnosed with cancer." The film had high artistic aspirations but didn't quite deliver. I was impressed by the director though.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ucYuomgAX5U

Also saw recently Dragon Inn, a 1967 by King Hu. This is a cheesy martial arts film in the Criterion Collection about swordsmen intervening to protect children of an executed General in 1457 China. It felt a little bit like a spaghetti western. The basic structure of the plot was solid but then specific situations were resolved so sloppily it was hilarious. The pace of the film was great. There was a fight about every 10 minutes. Lots of fun.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vrWRdYy72zA
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GAq31U-fOS0

This looks interesting, anyone familiar with the guy?

“Artists in LA discover the work of forgotten Polish sculptor Stanislav Szukalski, a mad genius whose true ... they find him living in obscurity in an LA suburb”. Ripped off description of the flick. Link to trailer below.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=sPkoW4cmqT8

I've had my eye on that doc, which is currently featured on Netflix.

Weird, eccentric artists? Count me in...

Just got back from seeing "2001: A Space Odyssey" on the big screen at the Imax and I think, at last, my knees have stopped shaking.

What a film experience. I've seen "2001" at least 20 times but never in a theater so this was one special moment.

Now I've seen both Tarkovsky and Kubrick on the big screen now and my opinion of both directors has grown exponentially.

P.S. Sherron, who fell asleep both previous times we watched "2001" together (never making it past the "Dawn of Man" sequence), stayed awake throughout and was very, very impressed.

>5 CliffBurns: Did you spot the one shot that didn't work in 70mm?

Robert, I did not. I admit I might have been too twitterpated by the whole experience.

I was especially curious to see how the model/spaceship shots would stand up and they still looked amazing.

For my money, the one shot that didn't work was the one of the lunar shuttle approaching the Moon with one limb of the Moon illuminated. It was pretty clear to us that the Moon image matted in was a photograph, and whilst possibly the best Kubrick could get in 1967-8, was never intended to be blown up to IMAX size.

But that was the only one. And that was the amazing thing, especially when you think that some of the early CGI spectaculars are getting to look a bit tired now from beginning to end. (Apollo 13 is a prime example.)

The carousel still blows me away (as Kubrick intended it to). Keir Dullea runs around the carousel and we all think "Wow!" And then, just to show how much control Kubrick has over his processes, Dullea runs around it AGAIN. The fact that I know how it was done doesn't take away from the experience. And that (like the EVA pods) wasn't just a set; it was built by a major UK aerospace contractor (who probably considered it to be a useful practice run for future spaceship contracts).

Nonetheless, I still think the most prophetic line in the whole film was a throwaway one early on. When Heywood Floyd phones home from the space station, he asks his daughter (actually Kubrick's daughter - think about that!) what she'd like for her birthday. Her first request is "A telephone", to which Floyd replies "We have lots of telephones."

Spot on. I'm a single man in a one-bedroom flat and I have three.

Dang! I signed up for the email alert when either the 70mm film or the imax was going to be available in my area but I have not seen a response. I saw the original with all the bells and whistles and it was great. Link to the original poster/ad for the movie in my area.

http://cinematreasures.org/theaters/689

#8 Ah, yes, Sher and I both remarked on that shot on the way home (an eight-hour round trip, just to see a movie).

And, like you, I was amazed by how well the film still stands up.

There are little moments, like when the early human is crouching amidst animal bones and then appears to...hear something. His eyes change as he gazes at the scatter of bones. Slowly, tentatively, he reaches out, plucks up one of the heavier pieces and...

Also, a nice scene with Bowman, after HAL locks him out--he recognizes the futility of arguing, comes up with the only possible solution, knows it will be dangerous tactic but is determined to try it anyway. His expression resolved, yet reflecting his dread of what he must do.

#9 I have the movie poster hanging right over my desk--the Pan Am rocket leaving the space station. Iconic.

Oh yeah, are you sure about the IMAX being larger than the original screen? The screen I saw the original on was huge and curved slightly if memory serves. Ah my link is to the newspaper ad for the movie in my city $2 or $1.50 !

...shot in Cinerama.

Sherron and I found the screen size almost overwhelming, it was hard to take in everything within the frame.

The 70mm print was old, imperfections and scratches, but we didn't mind a bit.

Films to watch for in 2019:

https://www.criterion.com/current/posts/6133-the-most-anticipated-films-of-2019

Watched "My Brother's Keeper" on Netflix, a documentary about four daft brothers who lived together on a remote farm in New York state. One of them is discovered dead, which sets off a chain reaction of investigation, arrest and trial.

Well worth the 90 minutes we spent in its company.

Recommended.

Plugged in Billy Wilder's "Ace in the Hole" tonight.

Cynical, timeless, a ruthless American reporter exploiting a personal interest story, with tragic results.

Kirk Douglas is admirably slimy.

Recommended.

"The Great Northfield Minnesota Raid"--disappointing 1972 western by uber-director Philip Kaufman.

Contrived and unimpressive, despite his later credits.

Two letters sum it up: P.U.

NOT recommended.

Watched a wonderful, original movie last night.

"The Aerial" was made in Argentina and we were completely enamored with its style and quirkiness, little homages to silent film classics. A very David Lynch-ian feel to it and fans of Guy Maddin will also find much to like.

Highly recommended and currently playing on Netflix.

I saw the movie “White Boy Rick”, a kid who sold drugs/guns and worked as an FBI & police informant starting at 14, mentioned in an earlier post:

https://www.librarything.com/topic/285160#6499506

The movie was convincingly gritty but the online article mentioned {link below} still stunnned me more - maybe the outrage diminishes with repetition. As far as I know Rick is still in prison in Florida according to the movie while the person who shot him has been out for years and is advocating for Rick’s release.

The Trials of White Boy Rick by Evan Hughes
https://magazine.atavist.com/white-boy-rick

"Blindspotting" tonight.

A buddy movie set in the rough streets of Oakland. A promising first 3/4 but the film gets too contrived and preachy in the last ten minutes.

Worth a look.

Fascinating documentary last night: "Three Identical Strangers", a true story of triplets who were separated at birth and raised in three different homes. The tale of how they get together is cool...but then things get weirder and darker as they begin to realize the reason why--

Well, no spoilers.

Check this one out, it's a dandy.

Upon the recommendation of my action-oriented older son, I watched "The Raid: Redemption" tonight.

Not my usual cup of tea, a mixed martial arts-oriented film set in an residential tower controlled by a crime lord, the police sent in the clean things out but the situation goes awry...

Fantastic stunt work, lightning fast editing, but this is pure fluff and entertainment to an old curmudgeon like me.

Still: worth noting that the same director, Gareth Evans, is also involved with "The Apostle", an intriguing horror film currently playing on Netflix...

Saw Children of Men by Cuaron. Had never seen it but got curious after seeing Roma. I found it both great and exasperating. The premise is moving, the environment fascinating, the plot never never stalls. The plot is so full of holes though, specially towards the climactic scenes. Situations are not believable even within the context of the movie. The acting is awful. Sometimes it feels like Julianne Moore is thinking "I can't believe I'm saying these stupid lines."

Michael Haneke's "Happy End" tonight.

Fantastic film, powerful and convincing.

Wonderful from the first frame to the last.

HIGHLY recommended.

Bertolucci's "The Conformist" last night.

Stylish, intelligent, filmed by the great Vittorio Storaro.

What more could you ask for?

My first film post of 2019 - https://iansales.com/2019/01/29/moving-pictures-2019-1/

Great piece on legendary screenwriter Ben Hecht:

https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2019/02/11/the-great-hollywood-screenwriter-w...

Something tells me he and I would've gotten on well...

My second film post of 2019: https://iansales.com/2019/02/06/moving-pictures-2019-2/

Watched Close Encounters of the Third Kind during the polar vortex for the first time since it first came out. The special effects were not as impressive but then again I didn't see it at the theater, and am not 12 yrs old. (I kept thinking of 70's rock arena concerts). Some details are a little bit sloppy. (That mother just gave up on the child way too easily when the aliens were pulling him away.) The images are so gorgeously composed though, and the story telling is exciting as always. That final section is still provokes wonder. Gotta like 70's Spielberg.

Also watched Dr. Zhivago recently. Gorgeous imagery, epic story telling. Nothing sloppy about this one. Many scenes remind you that is a very abridged version of a much richer story. The ending is a bit hurried. Kept wondering how a story like this would be received these days of political correctness. Should have seen this one during the summer, too much snow. Great movie though.

This weekend A Letter to Momo by Hiroyuki Okiura was a bit of a disappointment. The animation was great and the characters had a lot of potential but it just didn't amount to much. Metropolis by Rintaro was based on a story by Osamu Tezuka. For the first 15 to 20 minutes it was pretty impressive, a kind of Fritz Lang meets Blade Runner meets Les Miserables. Gritty, art deco, and epic. Unfortunately the movie is 147 mins and by the end it is just a a big cheesy mess.

Speaking of aliens:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PfPdYYsEfAE

Watched Cuaron's "Roma" tonight and we loved it.

The actress playing the housemaid, Cleo (Yalitza Aparicio), is a revelation, but the entire ensemble is excellent, even the kids, and both of us were very taken with this small, personal film.

Highly recommended.

My wife and I got to see "Roma" in a San Francisco movie theater and thought it was terrific.

Also, Peter Jackson's reworking of historic World War I footage into the documentary, "They Shall Not Grow Old," is astounding.

In addition, a recent, powerful viewing that comes to mind is the documentary about Nina Simone, "What Happened, Miss Simone?" from 2015.

I'll put that Peter Jackson flick on my "To Watch" list.

>29 mejix: I saw Dr. Zhivago when it was first released in CinemaScope 70 mm film at the same theatre I saw 2001.

As I remember it the film opens with a train zooming across the screen showing the Doppler effect as it speeds from right to left towards and then away from the screen.- made the audience nearly jump from their seats as the stereo system sound followed the train .

Anyone who says I teared up {as a sub teen boy} at the end of the film is a liar. Cinematography was stunning though out the flick, especially for the times I guess.

Roma is on my watch list, waiting for a good time to view.

What I remember most about "Zhivago" is that awful fucking theme music ("Lara's Theme"), played ad nauseam throughout the film.

Personally, I'd rather have my fingernails pulled out than watch it again, in 70mm or otherwise. Ponderous film, one of Lean's worst.

That one and "Sound of Music" will be the double bill I'll encounter when I'm finally consigned to hell for my various sins...

Well, Cliff, you've managed to diss two of my mother's favourite films, but I'll let you off. I was taken to see them numerous times in my childhood, and they probably made a great impression on me (and explain much). The scene in Zhivago where the train is sidetracked to allow the Great Bolshevik General's personal armoured train past, and as it thunders across the frozen steppe there's a reveal to show that said General is a character we last saw an hour ago getting wounded on the Eastern Front - at that moment, I wanted to be that Great Bolshevik General and thunder across the frozen steppe in my own armoured train!

(The railway scenes were mainly filmed in Spain, oddly enough, including that one; though some were done in Finland, I understand.)

OTOH, especially when l've watched the film in more recent times, the final scene "And what does your boyfriend do?" "He's an Operator." "And what does he operate?" "THIS!" (Cut to footage of Great Soviet Engineering Miracles, No.55: the Hydro-Electric Power Station, accompanied by the most surgingest of surging iterations of the film's main theme) now strikes me as very much of a nod to Soviet social realism and a bit of a sop to the real achievements of the Russian people after nearly four hours of a novel that was banned by the authorities, and more than a bit obvious.

As for "Sound of Music", don't get me started on that film's crimes against historical accuracy (or geography, for that matter). A key example of the wilful re-imagining of Maria von Trapp's personal history.

>33 DugsBooks:
I can't remember if I saw in the theater when it first came out, but yeah this is definitively a movie for the big screen and stereo!

>34 CliffBurns:
I love the theme song but it does stick to your brain. Hehehe

>35 RobertDay:
Yeah, that's another thing, some scenes felt very "movie made during the Cold War."

Watched another gem on Netflix last night, an Italian film called "Happy as Lazzaro".

Odd, quirky (things I love in a movie), with a dash of magical realism.

This one will definitely make my year end "Best of..." list (along with "Roma").

"First Man" tonight.

Convincing and powerful depiction of first moon landing.

The space flight scenes are stunning, I would've loved to have seen this one on the big screen. Excellent foley sound effects, in particular.

Superb effort, highly recommended.

>38 CliffBurns: I wasn't so impressed - https://iansales.com/2018/12/20/moving-pictures-2018-64/

A triple bill last night:

"Nightfall", a noir film directed by Jacques Tourneur. A little over an hour long, not a minute wasted. Seen it before but still fun (available on YouTube).

"Red Stuff", a documentary on the early Russian space program. Some terrific archival footage but otherwise only so-so.

"Starman", a doc on Yuri Gagarin--again, footage I'd never seen before but the film itself is merely okay.

Tonight, Sherron and I greatly enjoyed "Leave No Trace".

It's a film by Debra Granik, who was also responsible for another beauty, "Winter's Bone".

A father, traumatized by war, lives in the woods of Oregon with his adolescent daughter. But the real world is never far away...

Affecting and extremely well-acted.

Another one for my "Best of..." list.

Man, I've seen some excellent cinema this year.

My wife and I have recorded and are looking forward to watching the recent documentary, Minding the Gap.

https://www.mindingthegapfilm.com/

>41 CliffBurns: that sounds like something I'd love to see. I wonder if it's playing around here anywhere. Thanks! Had not heard of it.

It's available on DVD (got it through my library).

Maybe a streaming service? "Leave No trace" was released in 2018.

I love how under-stated it is, no huge blowups or high drama, just realistic and enthralling.

I agree that this was a great film, thoughtful and deeply moving in a totally unsentimental way. Granik was only one of several great female directors overlooked by the Oscars this year - totally male shortlist for best director. They really need to try harder in Hollywood.

And let's not forget Lynne Ramsay, director of "You Were Never Really Here".

Shame on the Academy!

Watched "American Dreamer", a documentary on Dennis Hopper at his weirdest. Shot in 1971 by Lawrence Schiller--Dennis and his crazy antics remind me an awful lot of Charlie Manson.

Quite chilling in places.

Available for viewing on YouTube.

A Czech "New Wave" film last night, Evald Schorm's "Return of the Prodigal Son".

Depressing and cleverly subversive--Schorn was one of the more politically oriented film-makers during the brief "Prague Spring" and I'm certain he paid the price for it afterward.

Not my favorite of the "New Wave" stuff I've seen but still worth a look.

I think Cliff has mentioned this news before, quote from article below - I don't know if this is USA only

"Criterion Channel
Rising out of the ashes of the now-shuttered FilmStruck, the Criterion Channel classic movie streaming service will make its debut on April 8, 2019.

Once it launches, the Criterion Channel will cost $11 a month or $100 if you pay for an annual subscription. But you can get a break on the price—$10 a month or $90 a year—if you're willing to sign up before the service goes live. Early birds can also get a free 30-day trial, plus accesss to the company's prelaunch Movie of the Week series, which is available exclusively for charter subscribers up until the service launches."

https://www.consumerreports.org/streaming-media-devices/streaming-video-service-...

I would guess limited to USA . Criterion only started releasing DVD/Blue Ray to Region 2(Europe) quite recently; I was amazed to hear that as had assumed they were available here in UK years ago.

Saw First Man on Blu Ray and liked it well enough but glad I did not put out effort to see it at the theaters. I was surprised how the plot was such a personal view on events of Armstrong's life, much of which had little to do with the actual moon mission. Cinematography - camera work etc. was great with profiles filling the screen and the scenes inside the space crafts making them look like the claustrophobic tin cans they probably were. The flick pulled at emotions pretty well.
I think I might have liked The Astronauts Wives shows that I saw a little better with the interplay of emotions/events there.

The Two Killings of Sam Cooke part of the Remastered series on Netflix. I only had a very general sense of Sam Cooke's career. What an incredible figure. The documentary is well done but I kind of feel that that story deserved something even better. (The series seems to be about unsolved mysteries in the music business.) Includes appearances by Quincy Jones, Smokey Robinson, Dionne Warwick, and Jim Brown. Cooke's death, looks very fishy but the conspiracy theories just don't make much sense to me. Worth watching though.

The first installment the Remastered series, Massacre at the stadium, is about Victor Jara's death during the coup in Chile. It's a very sad story but they were trying to cram many things into the documentary. Turns out the actual events were very different from what I had heard.

Wes Anderson's animated feature "Isle of Dogs" tonight.

Big disappointment. Sherron fell asleep partway through but I toughed it out 'til the end.

Terrific animation but the story is unconvincing and evokes little or no emotion from viewers.

Cold, antiseptic, aloof.

Not my idea of great film-making.

>50 DugsBooks: I didn't think The Astronauts' Wives Club series was very good. The highwater mark for dramatisation of the Apollo programme is still HBO's From the Earth to the Moon.

>53 iansales: Have not seen that yet will check it out.

I am currently watching the series “Mars” on Netflix which combines real life documentary clips from NASA with an SF story of the first landing on Mars. I was a little off put at first by the documentary breaks but now at the third episode I am enjoying the flick. A good deal of the enjoyment comes from the documentary part I think the fiction is a little weak at times in the drama but is still passable lMOHO.

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt4939064/

>54 DugsBooks: I've seen the National Geographic Mars dramatisation series. Is it that one? It seemed to me to cram a few too many disasters into it. There's also a French series, whose title I forget, but I didn't get past two episodes in that.

>51 mejix: - I heard about that program and it seems to have an agenda to believe the conspiracy theories rather than investigate the murder properly. Peter Guralnick, who wrote a biography of Cook, said in at least a couple of interviews that despite interviewing numerous people and analysing the evidence he couldn't find any evidence of any conspiracy but that every conspiracy that he was told, and he said he heard a lot, involved the white establishment organising his death. It makes a good story, much better than what appears to have actually happened.

>56 Jargoneer:
I mean, stranger things have happened but the theories just seem a bit convoluted. Doesn't really sound to my ears like the way mob or the FBI would operate. Maybe it was a job that went wrong? What is outrageous is that apparently the authorities didn't do a whole lot of investigation on the murder. Also, Sam Cooke deserves a really good documentary outside the framework of the series.

>55 iansales: yep the Nat. Geo is the one. After watching another episode I tend to agree with you. It seems they don’t try to get the Mars gravity right and there is one disaster after another. The documentary is ok but evidently they never mention the rovers and info gained from them. I will still burn an episode every now and then i guess.

Watched two movies in the past while:

"Smoking Aces", an action-thriller, directed by Joe Carnahan. Impressive cast, some big names playing minor or supporting roles. The film takes off like a bullet and doesn't slow up. The ending doesn't quite hold up but, still, a fun way to spend an evening. Carnahan also directed "Narc" a few years back and if you haven't seen that one (Ray Liotta, Jason Patric), man, you missed a good one.

Also saw "Last Man on the Moon", a documentary about Gene Cernan. Enjoyed it immensely as well.

"The Apostle" last night, written and directed (and edited) by Gareth Evans.

Eerie film, in the same vein as "The Wicker Man", but much longer and nastier.

It could have easily been cut by 20 minutes and some of the over-the-top violence toned down.

Still, it delivered some chills and a fine cast of character actors really raised the film to another level.

Sherron and I plugged in "The Favorite" tonight and were treated to some fine cinema.

Wonderful performances by the three actresses at the heart of the film and Yorgos Lanthimos adds another superb effort to his odd c.v.

Terry Gilliam's take on DON QUIXOTE--finally coming soon to North American cinemas. Watch for it!

https://www.vulture.com/2019/03/terry-gilliam-on-the-man-who-killed-don-quixote....

>61 CliffBurns: We went to see "The Favourite" (actually, we went to see "Stan & Ollie", but found ourselves in the mood for more film and so paid again to stop back and see "The Favourite"). Did you think of it as a period drama or a comedy? We both felt the latter way, and were surprised when we laughed at obvious jokes and found ourselves in the minority amongst the audience. ("Does the duck have to be here?")

We were possibly the oldest people in the cinema, so I wonder if the younger audience were too intent on classifying a film by its obvious genre and thinking that a Period Drama had, by definition, to be Serious.

We found "The Favorite" quite funny, and we giggled at various parts of Lanthimos' "The Lobster" as well. But Sherron and I have a rather off-beat sense of humor.

In the "Extras" accompanying the DVD of "The Favorite", one of the writers makes it clear they had no intention of being narrow-focussed on actual historical events, they were more interested in story and character. Which is far more honest than those twats who insist their film is "based on a true story".

Like that piece of garbage "The Green Book", for instance...

More cinema of the past than the future saw 1929 German version of The Hound of the Baskervilles at the local-ish silent film festival. This was the last silent film of Holmes and it never made it to the English speaking market. It was considered lost until two partial copies were found a few years ago, although most of reels 2 & 3 are still missing. It was preceded by a talk by Holmes expert David Stuart Davies who pointed out that Holmes of the silent cinema was more of an action man than a thinker - it is hard to portray a thinker when you can't vocalise his thoughts. Not a bad version but really only for those interested in silent cinema, otherwise stick to Rathbone and Bruce.

Jeremy Brett and Edward Hardwicke are the perfect Holmes & Watson to me.

>66 CliffBurns: - I wouldn't disagree with you but the Rathbone version is the best known and was a cinema release.

One fun fact from the talk: in the Hammer version of Baskervilles in order to make the dog look huge they decided to dress up two children as Holmes and Watson for the final confrontation. After filming for a week they decided they couldn't make it look anything other than two children playing with a dog so they gave up and stuck a mask on a great dane. (This is actually a decent version of the story but the climax is a little weak because of the dog).

>64 CliffBurns: Yet interestingly, the events of "The Favourite" were broadly in line with historical events. But the film didn't make a thing of it. In any case, any historical drama is never going to be in any way accurate; so why make a fetish of claiming otherwise?

Last night, Andrey Zvyagintsev's "The Banishment".

Long, nuanced, well-acted but somewhat cold. We enjoyed the way it played with our perceptions, so that by the end your understanding of the family drama at the heart of the film has been completely transformed.

Slow-moving, gorgeously lit and shot.

Not for everyone but it gets my recommendation.

We drove in to Saskatoon to watch the Lebanese film "Capernaum" and were not disappointed.

Devastating view of kids on the streets of Beirut, abandoned or forced out by the circumstances at home.

Amazing performances by mainly amateurish cast, emotionally authentic and honest.

Highest possible recommendation, this is the best film we've seen so far this year.

Watched Christopher's Guest's mockumentary "Mascots" last night.

Not as funny as "Waiting For Guffman" or "Best in Show", but a comedy with some really great moments and the usual cast of weirdo characters.

Available on Netflix, if you need a laugh.

Saw recently Happy As Lazzaro directed Alice Rohrwacher. I was very impressed by the boldness and the uniqueness of the director. By far the more interesting new director that I've seen recently. The changes in the tone of the movie kept me guessing. I don't need to see the movie again but I will definitely keep an eye on her work.

Went to see another couple of silent films at the weekend - Au Bonheur Des Dames, a visually impressive film about the dangers of rampant consumerism (some things never change, this was made in 1930 right at the end of silent era) & The Red Heroine, the oldest surviving martial arts film, which was a little odd.

A disappointing flick last night, "The Old Man and the Gun", starring Robert Redford and Sissy Spacek.

The film is based on a NEW YORKER article by David Grann (terrific writer)--Redford plays a habitual criminal, a man who's only happy when he's robbing banks.

The direction is poor, the film ponderous, the shots undistinguished and lacking purpose. Camera panning off the characters and drifting away for no good aesthetic reason.

Boringly shot, boringly acted. Even the car chases seemed slow motion.

Give it a miss.

>74 CliffBurns: Also, I didn't care a bit about the main character. Whatever his issues and motivations were, I wasn't moved to sympathy one bit. Always fun to see Tom Waits on screen, though.

Enjoyed "The Highwaymen" on Netflix, the Bonnie & Clyde story from the law's side. Thought it was good commentary on their legacy in general, that these killers are remembered/cast in an oddly heroic light even now.

>76 Cecrow: - and my immediate thought was of "The Highwayman", a bad 80's TV series starring Sam J Jones (yes, it's true, he did make something after "Flash Gordon"). It was one of those series where a man travels across America righting wrongs, although this one was set a little in the future. (It was described as Mad Max meets Knight Rider).

The making of "Clockwork Orange":

https://www.theguardian.com/film/2019/apr/02/how-we-made-a-clockwork-orange-malc...

Recent movies:
Chuck Norris vs. Communism- a documentary about the illegal VHS market in 1980s Romania. It focuses on a racketeer who may or may not have worked for the government and a female translator who apparently dubbed pretty much every movie that entered the black market, doing all the characters by herself. As interesting as it was I feel it could have been better. Many questions left unanswered. The subject was a bit too much for the director. Very entertaining though.

Let's Get Lost- a 1988 documentary on the life of jazz trumpeter and drug addict Chet Baker. The album for this documentary has long been one of my all time faves. The documentary has a grimy, black and white, rough look. Very 80's. I found this one somewhat morbid.

A Story from Chikamatsu- a 1954 film by Kenji Mizoguchi that Criterion released in 2018. The story revolves around a scroll maker in 1693 Japan, and his master's wife. What impressed me the most was the way the director presents a very complicated plot with patience and clarity. Great craftmanship. The ending is kind of underwhelming, almost an afterthought.

Also watched Waiting for the Artist, a Documentary Now parody of Magdalena Abramovic's The Artist is Present that someone was gracious enough to post on YouTube:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2QUUtjdOubE&fbclid=IwAR3PSLe6rjlWnHFiwvkvGQ2...

>79 mejix: Loved "Let's Get Lost." I saw it on Haight Street soon after it was first released. I got to see Chet Baker live shortly before he died in Kimball's Jazz Club in San Francisco. He was just a shell in almost every way, but it was still an entirely memorable experience.

My wife and I watched and were very moved by the documentary about James Baldwin, "I Am Not Your Negro": https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I_Am_Not_Your_Negro

>80 rocketjk:
Oh wow, that must have been quite an experience. He looked like crap in the film. I became obsessed with the album for the movie when I found it by chance a few years ago. Here's Baker doing Blame It on My Youth: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=swP4GyfmrnQ

We watched "Stan & Ollie", the biopic about classic comedy duo Laurel and Hardy.

Despite strong performances by Steve Coogan and John C. Reilly in the title roles, the movie seemed lifeless and unimaginatively shot. The whole affair seemed very contrived and formulaic.

Can't recommend this one.

>82 CliffBurns: Given that it was mostly set in 1950s Britain, for many Brits any shortcomings in the film beyond the performances of the principals were probably compensated for by the nostalgia element. Given that the heyday of Laurel & Hardy in the UK for present-day audiences was the 1960s with the re-running of many of their films on tv, the target demographic was mainly people now in their late 50s/early 60s and older; this was certainly the case when we went to see it. We enjoyed the film, but having decided on the spot to go around again and see 'The Favourite', it was very clear to us which the better film was.

Having said that, Steve Coogan's performance in particular was noteworthy, given that for most people he's better known for playing the comedy grotesque (fictional) tv chat show anchor Alan Partridge, a role he's made so much his own over a number of years that I'm sure many won't think of him in any other role.

Have you seen Coogan in "24 Hour Party People"? He plays Tony Wilson, head of Manchester's Factory Records, the folks behind Joy Division (among others).

Magnificent film, directed by Michael Winterbottom.

I highly recommend it.

I enjoyed 'Stan and Ollie' but not uncritically. I know enough about their lives and careers to recognise that (as in most biopics) facts were twisted and such matters as their winning through to large audiences in their last British tour were untrue.
Having said that I thought that both actors were terrific, uncannily inhabiting the Laurel and Hardy personas in recreations of their sketches and songs. A lot of their films have been screened here in the UK over the past year or so giving some of us audience members familiarity with them when the recreations were shown. There was also a rather sweet quality in the film without its descending into gross sentimentality. I do feel that in many ways it would appeal more to an older British audience who would recognize the period settings and some of the characters such as impresario Bernard Delfont, a very big name over here in the 50's and 60's.

Last night, Paul Schrader's recent film "First Reformed".

Ethan Hawke is one of my least favorite actors in the universe but I toughed it out.

Some okay scenes but the script is way too talky, the film channels at least two other Schrader efforts, "Light Sleeper" and "Taxi Driver", and the ending is utterly ridiculous.

Avoid this one.

Couple of movies in the last few days:

"The Other Side of the Wind", an unfinished Orson Welles film that a committee of people cobbled together decades after his demise. A mess, but a determined effort to give shape and context to hours of raw footage, much of it never viewed by Welles. I doubt even Orson could have made this work, had he somehow lived long enough to finish the job.

"Too Late", a well-intentioned mystery, starring the great John Hawkes. The film has an interesting structure but the first few minutes are unconvincing and the end result strangely unsatisfying. Recommended, but with reservations.

And, finally, "Houston, We Have a Problem", a mockumentary about the Yugoslav space effort in the 1960s. Good use of stock footage to tell a completely fictitious story. Not great, but well-conceived.

>87 CliffBurns: Sounds interesting. i watched Citizen Kane at least 5 times while taking a “media” course in school decades ago. In that Wells effort there were evidently several geniuses , camera people etc. who contributed but were not that recognized until later. I think you had to give Wells credit for recruiting and organizing the bunch.

i watched “The Mule” by Clint Eastwood the other day on blu ray dvd and enjoyed the flick. Interesting plot although not many twists and Clint does a good job as the lead. Worth a watch if your are bored on a weekend and can relate to an old fart character.
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt7959026/

Interview with director of Apollo 11 film--gotta somehow see this one:

https://www.slashfilm.com/apollo-11-director-interview

"White Boy Rick" last night, an excellent, convincing portrait of the 1980s drug scene in Detroit.

The movie is first-rate at creating the atmosphere of the period and the performances and direction convincing.

Highest recommendation.

>90 CliffBurns: I remember that case being discussed on this forum actually. There was a very long piece about it. Maybe the Atlantic? Anyhow, fascinating.

Werner Herzog's new film about Gorbachev:

https://melmagazine.com/en-us/story/werner-herzog-doesnt-do-introspection

>92 CliffBurns: Sounds interesting.

Have you seen "Houston, We Have a Problem", Ian?

I alluded to it in #87.

No, I haven't. Not seen many films over the last month. Swedish TV is terrible, and the only streaming service I have is Amazon Prime. I can't even watch DVDs as the TV in the apartment doesn't have a HDMI socket.

"Can You Ever Forgive Me", a bio pic about Lee Israel, who made a living passing off forged letters from famous authors back in the 1980s.

Good performances by Melissa McCarthy and Richard E. Grant but the film itself is rather flat and uninvolving and not very emotionally gripping.

Passable, but not great.

>96 CliffBurns: Tried watching that, lasted about ten minutes.

Watched "S is for Stanley", a documentary about the man who was originally hired to be Stanley Kubrick's chauffeur and became an essential part of his staff.

Offers more insights into Kubrick's controlling personality and perfectionism and Emilio D'Alessandro is an engaging personality and raconteur.

Martin Scorsese's "Silence" last night.

Disappointing. Glacially paced and ho-hum. Andrew Garfield spends much of the film in tears, a strange mindset for a highly trained Jesuit in the 17th century. Despite its subject matter, I didn't find "Silence" all that spiritual or moving.

Of only moderate interest, even to diehard Scorsese fans.

Sherron and I watched "Vice" tonight, the satiric bio-pic on the life of Dick Cheney.

Sher fell asleep 3/4 of the way through but that was because we spent much of the day doing yard work.

I usually hate biopics but this one chooses to take a different tack, avoiding a straight, linear approach--and Christian Bale is unbelievably good as Cheney.

Recommended.

>98 CliffBurns: you might find this radio broadcast I heard part of while driving over the weekend interesting/entertaining. It documents Kubrick and how 2001 came about, his meeting with Arthur C. Clarke, how 2001's premiere in New York City bombed with the critics etc. Great info from people who were there at the time.

https://www.pri.org/stories/2019-05-09/american-icons-2001-space-odyssey-part-on...

Thanks, so much.

I have been fascinated by Kubrick for ages--the incredible devotion he inspired in people, despite his obsessiveness--and, in particular, "2001".

I'll give your broadcast a listen. Appreciate the head's up.

>101 DugsBooks:, >102 CliffBurns:

I remember Arthur C. Clarke speaking at an assembly at my junior high school in New Jersey soon after 2001 was released. My memory is that he was asked how he liked the movie version of his book and he replied, "Well, I worked on the screenplay, so it's natural that I would like it."

At various times, I heard the late Bob Shaw and the not-so-late Ian Watson (who took over from Bob) talking about the development work they did with Kubrick on the project that eventually became A.I.: Artificial Intelligence. The impression that I got was that Kubrick was incredibly demanding, a pain to work with (especially as he thought everyone worked the same sort of mad hours he did) but full of ideas, intelligent, and a highly exciting creative person to be around. Although he paid well (as far as I could tell), neither writer gave the impression that they put up with him for the sake of the money (though others may know differently).

#101 Loved the Kubrick feature--great tip!

The only time Kubrick selected a list of his favourite films was in 1963 - https://faroutmagazine.co.uk/stanley-kubricks-top-10-favourite-films-of-all-time...

Watched "The Highwaymen" last night, with Kevin Costner & Woody Harrelson.

Mediocre crime picture, its subjects the men who killed Bonnie & Clyde.

Nothing new here, move on.

>107 CliffBurns: I have seen that flick. I thought Kevin & Woody did a good job and the flick presents a side/point of view of the victims for a change without a lot of the media Robin Hood hype that surrounded the criminal couple. Ok way to burn time when you have it.

#108--Frank Hamer was no sweetheart:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/2019/03/31/how-highwaymen-whitewashes-fra...

I haven't really been watching the Criterion channel since it started so I broke my cherry with a couple of shorts by Agnes Varda and then 8 1/2. I want Rossellini's hat.

Ultra-violent crime show last night, S. Craig Zahler's "Dragged Across Concrete".

Overlong, overly violent, the script occasionally discordant...it had its moments but the film just didn't come together in a cohesive whole.

Cinema for sadists.

This year's winner of the Palm d'Or:

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-48409063

Watched the thriller "Cold Skin" last night.

Man is sent to monitor weather at remote station just prior to World War I and finds himself besieged by creatures from the sea.

Some good bits, an adequate movie, but nothing great.

It's amazing the movies you can find on youtube. In the last couple of weeks I've seen Late Autumn by Ozu, Akira by Otomo, and some of Berlin Alexanderplatz by Fassbinder.

Late Autumn is about a group of friends trying to find husbands for the daughter and for the widow of a deceased friend. It is a very delicate and very minimalist film but in this very intimate situation you can get a sense of the social transformations of Japan in the early 60's. Gorgeous cinematography.

In Akira it's the year 2019, and the government of Neo Tokyo is conducting experiments that give powers to little children. The first 3/4 are a masterpiece. The last quarter is a little bit overextended and feels bloated, it doesn't live up to be rest of the story. What a great movie though. What spectacular visuals.

Berlin Alexanderplatz is described as a film in 13 episodes. Each episode is an hour and half. The ones I saw had some great moments, filmed with panache and intelligence. Then there's also a lot of padding. The plot moves very very slowly with many inexplicable pauses. It was very frustrating. I gave up after one and half episodes.

An old Peckinpah flick last night, "Cross of Iron" (1977).

A few good performances and action sequences but by this point Sam had run out of ideas and his substance abuse problems were getting the worst of him. He only managed two more movies after this one, neither of them very good.

Moonlight by Barry Jenkins. Beautiful movie about a young black man growing up in Florida. The last portion of the movie was not as convincing because of a casting mistake. Gorgeous movie though. Very elegant and soulful. Looking forward to more Barry Jenkins movies.

Sansho the Bailiff by Kenji Mizoguchi. The family of a deposed governor is separated and sold as slaves. This is essentially a fairy tale and has the logic of a fairy tale. The kind of movie where you can appreciate the artistry but not feel very engaged with the story.

Rolling Thunder Revue by Scorsese. You have to admire the crazy spirit behind this whole enterprise. Specially when you see it from our point of view in 2019. Some performances are great. But overall you just get the sense that this was a big mess. I failed to see why this was a big deal. Maybe they should've just stuck with the performances.

>116 mejix: "I failed to see why this was a big deal."

By "this," do you mean the tour or the movie? I was in college in Boston when this tour was going on and I got to see it twice, once in Providence and once in the gym in Brandeis University. It was a big deal because a) it was Dylan, who had only returned to live performing after a long time away a year or so previously. Then it had been in big concert venues with The Band, now it was going to be, mostly, in smaller venues. b) he had pulled together some of the great performers of his past and present to all go on the road with him together. Seeing Dylan singing with Baez again, for example, was a really welcomed development for those of us who'd remembered their interactions in the folk days of the mid-60s. Roger McGuinn, co-founder of the Byrds and one of (if not "the") musician who had shown Dylan that it was cool to play his songs with electric guitars. Mick Ronson, the hard rock guitarist, seemed a very intriguing choice to add to the mix. Adding Joni Mitchell mid-stream enhanced the mix with one more level of star power. Also, as was mentioned but not shown, other well-known musicians came and went with, as I remember it, regularity. For example, at the Brandeis show I saw, Arlo Guthrie played a multi-song set. The music, as you saw in the movie only in pieces, was often fabulous. That brief clip of Baez dancing, for example, was during a blistering version of 8 Miles High, the Byrds' psychedelic hit, with McGuinn blasting away on his electric 12-string. Finally, by the mid-70s, there had come the realization that the counter-culture, and the psychic and creative energy it represented to us, had peaked and was fading. These musicians represented that energy and creativity at its best, and to have them gathered together and on the road for one more go-round was a very meaningful event for those of us who were paying attention. (Although happily, individually, many of these musicians had many years of great music still in front of them. Dylan and Mitchell in particular.)

The movie I think is being seen as a very raw representation of the what it was like to be inside that fish bowl for the performers, and particularly for Dylan. And also, Scorsese decided to add a couple of layers of fiction to the narrative. Dylan was always a prankster in some respects, inventing persona and stories around himself to try to protect himself from the glare of unwanted attention from media and fans. In the movie, Scorsese recreates that sense with fictions of his own, with Dylan's obvious compliance. The van Dorp guy is entirely fictional, evidently. There was no such guy on the tour. Also, Sharon Stone's whole story is a fiction, as well. All this, presuamably, to try to recreate the "Looking Glass" nature of the times being chronicled.

Anyway, those are one guy's response to your "big deal" observation. I can see how it might not play entirely across generations.

Thanks for the post. You make a more compelling case than the documentary. I was not aware of the fictive element. Now I'm both amused and kind of annoyed. If that's the case that is a neat idea but its communicating only to people in the know. Maybe this is for Dylan fans primarily. I would've enjoyed a concert movie for sure. Dylan's voice in that period sounded great and the whole look was awesome.

>118 mejix: You're welcome.

"I was not aware of the fictive element."

A lot of people watched the movie not realizing that. Some folks are annoyed, feeling they've been played. If you have enough of an interest (I'd of course understand if you didn't), try watching the film again with that perspective in mind. One clue is that the title of the film includes the sub-title, "A Bob Dylan Story." When guys like Scorsese and Dylan use of the word "story" it's an indication that you might be about to go down a rabbit hole! Easy to say in retrospect, though, of course.

By the way, that aspect reminds me of Philip Roth's supposed autobiography, The Facts, which is subtitled, A Novelist's Autobiography. I always assumed that was fiction and the novelist in question was Nathan Zuckerman, not Roth.

Nah. Didn't see anything worth going back for to be honest. Maybe I'll get the bootleg records for the Rolling Thunder period some day.

Movies to watch for in July:

http://www.bbc.com/culture/story/20190626-ten-films-to-watch-this-july

Finally got a chance to see Terry Gilliam's "The Man Who Killed Don Quixote" and found it something of a letdown.

It lacked focus and didn't have the same visual flair as many of his other films.

Jonathan Pryce was wonderful but I felt Adam Driver's Toby/Sancho character didn't have a comprehensible psychology, his motivations and actions frequently mystifying.

Glad it finally made it to the screen, but "Man Who Killed Don Quixote" is minor Gilliam, a curio rather than a classic.

Last night it was "Yankee Doodle Dandy", the 1942 biopic of George Cohan, starring James Cagney.

Terrible movie and this from a huge Cagney fan.

Saccharine, phony, trite.

Avoid this one like a petri dish infested with leprosy.

That’s interesting. We had just looked up the song Yankee Doodle Dandy, because we were talking about it on the 4th of July. I hadn’t known that it was from a Cohan movie. I was pretty positive the movie would be really patriotic and fairly unwatchable, though, and now here you come to confirm that!

ETA well now, I was talking about the Cohan film and you’re talking about a film about Cohan. Whoops! I bet they were both pretty bad, though!

Here's a truly great song about the 4th of July, courtesy X:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K_tyWt_9Bfs

Terrific indie film tonight, "Thunder Road". Written, directed, edited by and starring Jim Cummings.

A small town cop at the end of his tether tries to come to grips with the death his mother and losing custody of his daughter.

Intense, surprising, emotionally powerful.

This one will undoubtedly make it on to my "Best of" roster at the end of the year.

Sherron and I watched a truly great film last night, "Birds of Passage", from the folks who brought us "Embrace of the Serpent".

Weed-growers in Colombia in the 1970s and 80s get rich and crazy shit starts happening.

Another one that will make my "Year's Best" list.

Amazing movie.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QV0uWf72ZQw

Last weekend I saw an oldie, The Maltese Falcon. I had never seen it before though I've read the novel a couple of times. It was great. I need more bogart in my future.

"The Big Sleep" is just as good.

>129 CliffBurns: Favorite scene from the Big Sleep - 2 minutes.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ot9XuZls9Y0

I love both of these Bogart movies, but, arguably, 'The Maltese Falcon' is closer to Hammett's book than 'The Big Sleep' is to Chandler's story. The beefing up of the relationship between Marlowe and Mrs Regan(with their admittedly terrific sexy dialogue) was obviously intended to exploit Bogart and Bacall's off-screen relationship. It worked as. the film was highly successful.

However for my money the best screen Marlowe is Dick Powell in' Murder My Sweet' ( based on 'Farewell My Lovely'). He has just the right blend of cynicism and bruised romanticism played in a low key manner that seems to reflect Chandler's character accurately- at least it does for me!

Worst Chandler adaptation, "The Long Goodbye", with Elliot Gould.

What a dud. Altman knew nothing of the detective genre...or, at least, his take on it was inept.

>132 CliffBurns: The Robert Mitchum one isn't too bad, nor is the James Garner one.

>132 CliffBurns: Did anyone ever "Hammett," directed by Wim Wenders? It's a bit of a mess but I liked Frederic Forrest's "look" as Dashiell Hammett and I love the cast. To name a few, it includes Peter Boyle, Elisha Cook, Jr., director Sam Fuller, Jack Nance, Marilu Henner and Sylvia Sidney.

>134 robertajl: I must look out for that one. I agree that the cast list is terrific. Many thanks for the tip.

Odd indie feature "QUEEN OF EARTH" last night.

Directed by Alex Ross Perry and starring Elizabeth Moss.

Occasionally intriguing but unfocussed, meandering. Strong performances, but it really didn't pass the "so what?" test.

I thought there were numerous nods to Roman Polanski throughout the picture--was it some kind of strange homage?

>136 CliffBurns: I saw that last year, I think, and was supremely unimpressed.

"Score", a documentary about music composed for film.

Interesting in places but not enough time devoted to early pioneers, focussing instead on contemporary musicians.

Recommended, but not essential.

The 1971 thriller "Klute" last night, directed by Alan Pakula.

Jane Fonda won an Oscar for her performance and Donald Sutherland is so laidback he seems almost asleep.

The film might have been tense and exciting back in the early 70s but it seems pretty predictable today. The music score is mediocre and it ends with one of those long, drawn out confessions from the killer.

Okay, but over-rated.

Just finished watching Stalker by Tarkovsky. I missed some crucial pieces of dialogue so I need to re-watch some sections. The jury is still out. Still, it is pretty impressive how Tarkovsky creates an enigmatic atmosphere with such limited resources, and how he sustains interest with so little plot development.

Also saw a little video on the making of Stalker. Mucho sad.

>140 mejix: I liked his film techniques, like at the beginning when the camera has the people talking at a distance- small figures. As the camera shot slowly zooms in on them you at the same time learn more and more about them through their conversation, until by the time the people fill the frame you have a good idea of who each character is.

At the end the camera slowly zooms out and as the figures get smaller they explain they aren’t sure they know anything about each other and, by the time they are tiny figures again , that their perception of reality has changed so much they aren’t sure of themselves.

At least that is how I remember it - probably had a wine buzz or whatever at the time.

"Stalker" is my favorite Tarkovsky film. I've even had the privilege of watching it on a big screen--wow.

The long shots, the sense of the ineffable, the indescribable, lurking just out of peripheral vision, beyond the reach of the frame.

Stunning.

Last night, another indie feature by Alex Ross Perry, "Listen Up, Philip".

More enjoyable and coherent than "Queen of Earth", but the obnoxious writer character, played by Jason Schwartzman, is pretty insufferable and annoying.

Another standout performance from Jonathan Pryce, who plays an aging literary lion.

Not for everyone, but recommended.

>141 DugsBooks:
>142 CliffBurns:
Yes, the camera work is one of the more intriguing aspects of the film. Sometimes it feels as if there is a fourth person accompanying these people.

"The Sisters Brothers" last night, a western based on a novel written by Patrick de Witt.

Had the same trouble with the movie that I did with the book--the dialogue seemed too contemporary, wrong for the era.

Some good bits but lacking even a great cinematographer to provide those gorgeous western vistas made famous by John Ford et al.

At Eternity's Gate by Julian Schnabel. A sublime performance by Willem Dafoe in a shapeless mess of a movie. One featurette mentions that Schnabel improvised the movie, and it really shows. Dafoe emphasizes the hyper sensitive, mystic Van Gogh, over the cranky, angry, Van Gogh. A very persuasive interpretation of the artist. Probably the definitive interpretation.

Stanley Kubrick's "Napoleon":

http://www.bbc.com/culture/story/20190808-was-napoleon-the-greatest-film-never-m...

"Galveston" last night, a thriller starring Ben Foster and Elle Fanning.

Superb performances, superb cinematography, the movie good until the last three minutes or so, when a tacked on ending softens an otherwise downbeat resolution.

Recommended.

Kenji Mizoguchi's "Ugetsu" last night.

This one regularly appears on all-time "Best of..." rosters and was one of Andrei Tarkovsky's favorite films.

Beautifully shot, well-acted, intriguing. Sixteenth century Japan was not a place for the weak of heart.

Highly recommended.

"Zama" is a great film, deservedly compared to Herzog's "Aguirre, Wrath of God".

Spanish functionary is trapped in colonial-era Argentina, part of a decaying community. Desperation causes him to join an expedition hunting a notorious bandit...and things go downhill from there.

Another one for my year end "Best of..." list.

Drove in to the big city (Saskatoon) to watch "A Clockwork Orange" at the Remai Art Gallery.

I've seen it five or six times previously, but never on the big screen.

Nearly 50 years later, it's dated hardly more than a second, still packing sufficient wallop for us to talk about it all the way home.

Malcolm McDowell is unbelievably great in the movie.

Orson Welles dishes the dirt on fellow directors:

http://www.openculture.com/2019/09/orson-welles-trashes-famous-directors.html

(Thanks, Gord.)

Watched Bogart/Bacall in "The Big Sleep" again.

So much fun.

Francis Ford Coppola Rights a Wrong by Restoring Black Scenes to The Cotton Club

I remember seeing the movie and liking it but never heard of stuff like this - from the article:

"When financiers told him that his troubled 1984 production had “too many black stories,” the Oscar winner gave in. Now, he tells Vanity Fair, he’s releasing the movie he always meant to make."

"Coppola had been recruited to the project by producer Robert Evans, the charismatic former Paramount studio chief whom he’d battled relentlessly during the making of The Godfather. Their partnership was even more fraught on The Cotton Club, which was plagued by ballooning costs, producer infighting, behind-the-scenes intimidation, and a garish crime when one of the film’s financiers was kidnapped and killed at the direction of a drug-dealer girlfriend who wanted in on the project."

Terrible movie, from start to finish. Restoring it would be like painting a pig: interesting, but completely ineffectual.

Commentary on new big budget sci fi film, "Ad Astra":

https://www.theguardian.com/film/2019/sep/16/ad-astra-movie-toxic-masculinity-br...

Thoughts, Ian?

>156 CliffBurns: The flick was streamed to the denizens of the ISS and there is a NASA clip of Brad Pitt asking for a review of the movie from an astronaut there in a live interview. Pitt was blunt and wanted to know did he or Clooney {edit, in “Gravity”}do the best weightless act.

Watched "Apollo 11", a documentary compiled from recently discovered "lost" 65-mm footage.

Exemplary, stunning, amazing.

I'm a space geek so this sort of thing fuels my obsession.

A must-see film.

Here's the trailer:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qCWnLhBE6hw

Tried to watch "Alita: Battle Angel", directed by Robert Rodriguez, last night but it was so dull and over-stuffed with CGI we gave up.

Not a real frame in the movie and the script was clearly an afterthought. Derivative and silly.

Eye candy, in the worst sense of the term.

And Rodriguez is a talented director (in the past). What the hell happened to him?

Sherron and I did something we rarely do these days, went to a movie theater to watch a film.

I thought "Ad Astra" would be a good one to see on a big screen but it turned out to be yet another disappointing science fiction movie.

Dull, overlong, too talky...how they got funding for it is beyond me. A few cool set pieces but the film is emotionally flat, no conflict, no drama, only mildly interesting.

NOT recommended.

>160 CliffBurns: Thanks for the heads up, I almost took a break and went to see the same flick. I will catch it on DVD I guess.

There's just NO payoff, nothing that makes you walk out of the theater 121 minutes later feeling enlightened or uplifted or, well, anything.

Every fucking science fiction film with a smattering of smarts gets compared to "2001: A Space Odyssey".

Happened with "Interstellar" and now "Ad Astra".

Neither of them had the scope and intelligence and film-making prowess of Kubrick's masterpiece. They're literal, rather than allusive, and that's what brings them crashing down to earth.

>162 CliffBurns: I think 'Interstellar' got compared to '2001' because Christopher Nolan intended it as an homage. I felt he started with the scene in the Tesserect, which was so obviously intended to echo the Brain Room in Kubrick's film, and then built the rest of the film to get to that point. That's about as literal as you can get.

Whether Kubrick would have felt honoured by such an homage is another matter entirely.

Tarantino chats with Scorsese:

https://www.dga.org/Craft/DGAQ/All-Articles/1904-Fall-2019/Conversation-Scorsese...

Alex Ross Perry's "Her Smell" last night.

Sherron found the film annoying, especially the audio track, which was marred by ambient sounds that rendered much of the dialogue for the first half of the film unintelligible.

But I stuck with it and was rewarded with a magnificent performance by Elizabeth Moss--she holds nothing back and achieves the best screen acting I've seen in many a moon. She is electrifying.

My wife is away for a few days so I've taken the opportunity to watch two films she likely wouldn't care for:

"The Hit" (1984) Directed by Stephen Frears; starring John Hurt, Terence Stamp & Tim Roth.

A grass, on the run for ten years, is kidnapped in Spain by two hitmen and transported back to France for execution.

Some good moments but not very involving or dramatic. A "B-minus" film with A-List cast.

&

"Hitchcock and Truffaut", a documentary on a series of interviews Truffaut conducted with his idol in the mid-1960s. Contemporary film-makers throw in their two-cents' worth. The funny thing is a number (including Scorsese) admit that Hitch's film are often implausible or illogical but insist they're great anyway. I find that reasoning specious, to say the least.

"We Own the Night", a commonplace cop thriller, starring Joaquin Phoenix and Mark Wahlberg (whom I detest).

Nothing new or original--although I fear I have developed a terrible crush on Eva Mendes.

That's what Sherron gets for leaving me alone for one of her road trips.

"The Banishment", directed by Andrey Zvyagintsev.

Second viewing of haunting film by my favorite living Russian director.

A family disintegrating, portrayed in excruciating detail. Powerful film, loved it more the second time around.

"Without Gorky" is a quiet, intimate, documentary on the effect of painter Arshile Gorky's suicide on his family, which continues to reverberate decades after it happened. The film was directed by Gorky's grandaughter and sometimes it is hard for her to distance herself from the persons she is interviewing (her mother, aunt, and grandmother). Still, I thought it was a great portrait of the family of an artist, and the sacrifices they make. It gives a good sense of the everyday life that surrounds an artist, (the period leading to the suicide is presented with rich detail). The documentary is also a portrait of the devastation that a suicide leaves behind and the guilt and resentment it creates; and of the level of crap that women had to go through in the mid 20th century.

Watch the short film on stop-motion pioneer Willis O'Brien:

https://filmschoolrejects.com/king-clay-willis-h-obriens-stop-motion-reality

The on-going appeal of Chris Marker's "La Jetee":

https://lithub.com/did-this-iconic-1962-short-film-show-us-our-dark-future

Documentary on Terry Gilliam:

https://www.theguardian.com/film/2019/nov/11/he-dreams-of-giants-terry-gilliam-l...

Why Scorsese was right to call out super-hero movies:

https://jacobinmag.com/2019/11/martin-scorsese-superheroes-movies-film-cinema-co...

"Under the Silver Lake" last night.

A "neo-noir" and quite good. Man goes looking for missing woman and discovers weird sub-cultures in contemporary Los Angeles.

Somewhat overlong and it sort of peters out at the end, but complex and intelligent, worth a look.

>174 CliffBurns: Did not like that film myself. Felt like too many ideas were secondhand, although it did have its moments.

It's unusual, at times unabashedly weird. Not perfect, but a whole lot better than most of the crap being released these days.

If Andrew Garfield hadn't been attached to the project I have doubts it would ever have been made.

Can you imagine the "pitch"?

But that's not necessarily a good thing. Check out some non-Anglophone cinema, you'll find hugely superior films. (I know you do watch non-Anglophone cinema, I'm just saying Under the Silver Lake doesn't stack up so well when comparing against non-Anglophone cinema.)

The film I want to see more than any other right now is "Tigers Are Not Afraid", a Mexican flick directed by Issa Lopez.

https://variety.com/2019/film/reviews/tigers-are-not-afraid-review-vuelven-12033...

...that and "Parasite" by Bong Joon-ho...

Werner Herzog's "ecstatic truth":

https://lithub.com/at-the-heart-of-werner-herzogs-brilliance-an-uncomfortable-re...

Agnes Varda:

http://www.bbc.com/culture/story/20191125-greatest-films-directed-by-women-film-...

They keep trying to adapt McCarthy's BLOOD MERIDIAN:

https://melmagazine.com/en-us/story/blood-meridian-movie

Saw The Irishman by Scorsese on Netflix, in two installments. Kind of a cold movie, in the palette and in the approach. Great acting and great craftsmanship in the storytelling. Pacino and DeNiro were both very good. Joe Pesci was a surprise. Very moving ending though there are details I don't understand. A story about a very restrained character told in an expansive way. Interesting but did it need to be 3:30hrs?

>183 mejix: I enjoyed the movie also. I was not disturbed or intimidated by the length of the movie since I watched it in the streaming format and took a couple of breaks. "Great craftsmanship" , yep it was nice to watch a flick that performed several levels above the typical fare of online choices. Not the "Godfather" in impact but production values near the same I would think.

I have just watched Ciro Guerra's 'Embrace of the Serpent' which turned up on television and was quite mesmerised by it. The beautiful black and white cinematography was entirely right for a film set in the Amazonian jungle early in the 20th Century. The themes of colonialism, destruction of habitat for material gain, a lost spiritual dimension to life needing to be recovered both by the solitary shaman and the white men whose missions he aided set up all sorts of echoes in my mind. I felt that it was a film that speaks to our own self-destructive times. This was definitely one of my prime film experiences of this year- quite wonderful.

#185 Loved that movie.

Try to lay your hands on "Birds of Passage" by the same folks. Another great movie.

Many thanks. I had not heard of this one and will make a note.

>184 DugsBooks: Me too, I also saw it online. I got the sense that this was not really meant for the theater, or that the release in Netflix factored in the way it was produced.

"The Limey", 20 years later:

https://www.rollingstone.com/movies/movie-features/steven-soderbergh-interview-2...

Lovely piece on one of my favorite under-appreciated movies, "Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow":

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/film/sky-captain-and-the-world-of-tomorrow/kerry-kev...

>190 CliffBurns: Absolutely loved that film - but when we went to see it here in the UK, we had a private showing because the multiplex screen we went to was empty. I suspect it only ever played to people who knew of the pulp traditions it was referencing - and that's a pretty small demographic these days. In the UK, it was even smaller.

I did hear a rumour at the time that Kerry Conran was working up a development of Wells' 'War of the Worlds', but I suspect that was wishful thinking.

One of the big things I learnt from my time in science fiction fandom was how to rub shoulders nonchalantly with Big Names (even if they are only Big Names in your small pond). That stood me in good stead later, when I rubbed shoulders professionally with Big Names in a different pond. A shame the Conrans never had that experience; their story might have been happier, and they wouldn't have had to sacrifice any of their geeky originality.

Ah, glad we share an affection for that movie, Robert. More people should seek it out, it deserves to attain at least "cult" status.

John Waters defines "cult" to mean "three smart people liked it and nobody paid to see it".

Last night Sherron and I went to see "Knives Out" on the big screen and found it charming. Great cast and the plot had some lovely twists and turns.

Recommended.

>190 CliffBurns: >191 RobertDay: I've championed the film for years. Wasn't surprised it bombed, though - it used narrative techniques straight out of 1930s serials and pulp drama, and that didn't play with a 1990s/21st century audience. Another film I've championed, and which I've always said is a deal smarter than people give it credit for, is John Carter.

>193 iansales: Agreed. Though i think it bombed for similar reasons (on top of studio shenanigans). Edgar Rice Burroughs is no longer a household name.

I thought "John Carter" was the best adaptation possible--Burroughs is a dreadful author and the movie was far better than any of his books.

>194 RobertDay: I've read rumours the marketing was sabotaged by Disney after there was a change of leadership and Stanton pissed off the wrong person. For one thing, the title John Carter is meaningless unless you know the books. A Princess of Mars wouldn't have worked either, but John Carter of Mars would have been perfect.

>195 CliffBurns: Would have been interesting to see the Conrans' adaptation, though. Guess we'll have to put it up there with Jodorowsky's Dune...

Watched Ari Aster's "Midsommar" today--kind of a "Wicker Man" for a new, violent age.

I didn't much care for Aster's previous flick, "Hereditary", I thought it too ugly, gory and just plain mean-spirited. "Midsommar" is an improvement but there are several scenes that were unnecessarily gut-churning and over-the-top gruesome.

Not recommended for anyone who doesn't have a strong constitution (or sturdy bag to barf into).

"Far From Vietnam" last night, a collaborative effort involving Godard, Lelouch, Varda and several other film makers, exploring the war from the point of view of the Viet Cong.

There are some good sections but much of it is pretentious, VERY 1960s, dated and contrived.

>198 CliffBurns: i liked Kens Burns’ documentary Vietnam. He put effort into getting both sides stories.

Loved the Burns series. Love most of his stuff.

BBC critic picks best films of 2019:

http://www.bbc.com/culture/story/20190902-the-best-films-of-2019-so-far