RNL
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Post by RNL on Aug 2, 2006 23:03:27 GMT
films which can be defended simply as... Dadaist Dadaist? How so?
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Post by Michael on Aug 2, 2006 23:18:17 GMT
Dog Door (Stille Nacht V) Timothy Quay / Stephen Quay 2001 UK 1st time; YouTubeA dog masturbates over a spread-eagled doll.Probably the most narratively coherent of the series, with the most blatant symbolism too That's funny, I actually rate Dog Door as the Quay brothers' worst for this exact reason.
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RNL
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Post by RNL on Aug 2, 2006 23:31:28 GMT
I just didn't think the Tom Waits music in Stille Nacht V meshed as well with the images as His Name Is Alive's did in II and IV.
I'm not sure I saw any symbolism in there, but the dog looks like a nod to Starewicz.
I actually think that if the Quays were given ample resources and allowed to do exactly what they wanted, what they'd produce would not be even remotely rational. They're totally invested in the image.
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Boz
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Post by Boz on Aug 3, 2006 1:36:11 GMT
Wetdog, I've recently been interested in seeing Black Rain. I've come to like Ridley Scott and feel like Black Rain might hold the same kind of intensely 80's type thing that Thief had going on. What'd you think of it? It's an okay genre movie, nothing to get excited over. It is visually coherent, though - lots of steam, whirling fans and tight angles (like Alien, actually). I'll have to see it. I've really enjoyed most of the Ridley Scott I've seen, especially Alien. Thanks for the info.
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Capo
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Post by Capo on Aug 3, 2006 17:15:59 GMT
Dog Door (Stille Nacht V) Timothy Quay / Stephen Quay 2001 UK 1st time; YouTubeA dog masturbates over a spread-eagled doll. Probably the most narratively coherent of the series, with the most blatant symbolism too That's funny, I actually rate Dog Door as the Quay brothers' worst for this exact reason. I wouldn't say "worst" is the right word, but I understand where you're coming from. I wouldn't say any of those four shorts Wet Dog linked us to were particularly earth-shattering. Perhaps it's the format I saw them in - YouTube isn't the perfect way to see a film by any means. "Dadaist? How so?" They seem to reject all other notions of Art; but perhaps surrealism is the better term, and one which would be a lot more fashionable for fans to use in defence of the brothers' films. If a work means to be surreal, it can get away with anything, right?
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Capo
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Post by Capo on Aug 3, 2006 17:20:43 GMT
I actually think that if the Quays were given ample resources and allowed to do exactly what they wanted, what they'd produce would not be even remotely rational. They're totally invested in the image. Images aren't rational? I wasn't talking about plots being understandable or coherent; I mean images, and the way they're edited together, would perhaps be more "connected", as one, instead of a series of stand-alone visuals edited to music so as to be brought together in some kind of continuous thread. That's why I'd rate Street of Crocodiles (which I saw on the big screen, by the way, as opposed to YouTube) their best, from the five films I've seen.
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RNL
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Post by RNL on Aug 3, 2006 18:03:11 GMT
They seem to reject all other notions of Art; How do you mean? I don't see that streak in them at all. They're definitely Surrealists, of a type. Why should any artwork need to 'get away with' anything? There's no creative laws to break or inherent obligations to meet. I'm not sure what you mean by 'get away with'. They can be rationalised, but whether they must be or can be in their entirety (all "1000 words") is debatable. Yeah, that's what I thought you meant. But Dramolet and Are We Still Married? each present a totally coherent space and time, a fully rendered environment, not disconnected images edited to music.
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Capo
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Post by Capo on Aug 3, 2006 21:57:34 GMT
In order of viewing: Zamilované maso Meat Love Jan Svankmajer 1989 US/UK/West Germany 1st time; YouTube Two lumps of raw meat fall in love. Brilliant stop-motion animation, colourful, with old-fashioned music; there's nothing like a bit of raw love…love is a butchery?Et Cetera Jan Svankmajer 1966 Czechoslovakia 1st time; YouTube Three shorts within a short: a primate learns how to fly with four pairs of wings; a human whips an animal into submission three times; a man attempts to draw a house over and over again. Brilliant, simple animation with a somewhat nightmarish feel; it feels like one of those fever dreams in which humans become tiny 2-D drawings. Thematic similarities with Beckett: the futility of life, as well as some sign of frustration with form: a figure drawing his way to curiosity, and thence to insanity.Spiel mit Steinen A Game with Stones Jan Svankmajer 1965 Austria 1st time; YouTube A clock spits out stones every hour, and various patterns are formed. Visual gags and poetry with the most mundane of all objects, rocks; the patterns get more ambitious and impressive as it goes on, but it could probably be shorter.Flora Jan Svankmajer 1989 US 1st time; YouTube A bed-ridden "vegetable", or a human comprising vegetables, rots and explodes. A thirty-second short of such explosive visual power that it will linger for a while, before you want to watch it again. It sounds like a Lynch film, and is horrific to look at, in an attractive sort of way.Kyvadlo, jáma a nadeje The Pit, the Pendulum and Hope Jan Svankmajer 1989 Czechoslovakia 1st time; YouTube Black-and-white images of death and devilry to the sounds of an industrial furnace. Industrial furnace indeed - if a literal meaning of that phase fails to register, the imagination might define it better. An atmospheric, rather frightening affair which clocks in under two minutes; most feature films fail to reach Svankmajer's level of intensity.
Wet Dog, I'd be grateful if you checked my countries over; IMDb may be wrong.
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Capo
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Post by Capo on Aug 4, 2006 12:36:52 GMT
Rabbit-Proof Fence Phillip Noyce 2002 Australia 1st time; TV In 1930s Australia, three young half-caste girls escape the camp intending to domesticate them into the white community, and trek across the Outback to their home. The kind of film the general public are inspired by and critics fall in love with; it is impressively shot by Christopher Doyle, but you never really get a sense of the heartbreak the girls must be feeling when separated from their mother, the alienation they feel once in the camp, or the adversity they face when trying to get home. Short enough to be of passing interest.Strangers on a Train Alfred Hitchcock 1951 US 1st time; TV A tennis player has a chance encounter with a maniac, who suggests the two combine forces: the maniac is to kill the tennis player's wife, and the tennis player is to kill the maniac's father. Cinematic story-telling at its finest; besides the initial conversation between the two, this could be told entirely in images, from the contrasting opening shots of feet walking to the same place but in different directions, to the suspense set-pieces around which the narrative revolves: the murder at the playground, the would-be attempt from Haines to warn Bruno's father, and the climactic merry-go-round scene - the macabre hilarity of which is telling of Hitchcock's sense of humour, even at the most seemingly inappropriate of times.
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Boz
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Post by Boz on Aug 4, 2006 13:04:10 GMT
Last Days 2005/Van Sant My first Van Sant. Contrary to how I thought I'd feel, I found his choice of incredibly long, un-moving shots to be almost refreshing against the backdrop of most other recent cinema. The best aspect of the film, to me, was Van Sant's work with subliminal audio manipulation, something I had only ever seen Paul Thomas Anderson do. At random points throughout the film, we hear a seemingly random collage of audio clips that, in some strange way, helps us to understand our main character's feelings. I loved this in Anderson's films and I loved it here too. Van Sant's film clearly benefits from the lure and tragic mystery surrounding Cobain's death, even to someone like me who knows little about it. Rarely do I find myself so enamored in every nuance of a character's movements and speech patterns as I did here. This attests to Michael Pitt's performance, which I've been told is spot-on with Kurt. There was just a beautiful sense of complacency and tragedy surrounding this whole thing that I found fascinating. It lived up to the hype.
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Post by Vercetti on Aug 4, 2006 15:34:34 GMT
His performance isn't spot-on to Cobain. Kim Gordon of Sonic Youth did tell him a few pointers, though. She plays the "Record Executive" in the film who tries to take him away. Van Sant knew Cobian and was gonna have him in his next film playing a professor or teacher, but his murder stopped that, along with other things like a collaboration with Michael Stipe of REM. Van Sant said he deliberately did a complete 180 in how he wanted "Blake" to act. Cobain wasn't the suicidal maniac the media made him out to be. Collateral Michael Mann 2004 US 3rd time; DVD An LA taxicab driver has a hellish night when a hitman takes a ride. A fresh, exciting film which works on two levels: the rather Maguffin plot of a professional killer making his way through four key witnesses and a prosecutor for a major indictment, and the tense rivalry and ultimate connection between the all-action hitman and the all-talk cabbie; life's too short, and Mann's DV visuals, full of cool hues, embody at once a bleak and hopeful tone. I forget, two stars is what again? I remember my two stars differs with yours.
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Post by Michael on Aug 4, 2006 16:44:52 GMT
Michael Pitt's performance in Last Days is one of the greatest I've ever seen. Van Sant was lucky to have him.
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Post by Vercetti on Aug 5, 2006 2:45:50 GMT
Miami Vice Review is coming
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Post by Michael on Aug 5, 2006 7:48:23 GMT
Carlito's WayThis is an excellent film, and the only one I've seen from DePalma that isn't a complete disaster. I'd like to say more, but I'm way too tired.
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Capo
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Post by Capo on Aug 6, 2006 20:06:09 GMT
I forget, two stars is what again? I remember my two stars differs with yours. "A good film, for whatever reason."
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Omar
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Post by Omar on Aug 6, 2006 23:12:02 GMT
Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby(2006/Adam McKay) [First Viewing] A pit crew mechanic becomes an overnight success with racing, but soon experiences a reversal of fortune.The fact that all the people I saw this with hated it says something to me. Beyond all the humor, I saw a film that attacked the southern Bible belt and ignorant American patriotism. I'd like to think that this is what the filmmakers were going for, but I doubt it. The Southerner(1945/Jean Renoir) [First Viewing] A poor southern family struggles to grow their own crop.Often considered Renoir's best American film, this was rather melodramatic, with only a few moments that reminded me of the true Renoir. It's apparent throughout that there was a lot of interference during the making of the film.
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Capo
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Post by Capo on Aug 8, 2006 16:50:35 GMT
Pierrot le fou Jean-Luc Godard 1965 France/Italy 1st time; DVD A married man bored with his life runs away to the south of France with his babysitter. Drenched in colour, politics and philosophy, this is often credited as the film which combined all of Godard's preoccupations. Most interesting is the constant self-reflexivity, attractive not only in itself but because of the sparkling performances from Karina and Belmondo; it looks absolutely gorgeous, too, with some incredible long-take sequences, the most impressive of which has the present and a flashback happen in the same take, with actors disappearing out of frame and re-entering in a different time, but the same space. Almost impossible to sum up.Made in U.S.A. Jean-Luc Godard 1966 France 1st time; DVD When she discovers her journalist fiancé has been killed, a woman investigates the circumstances of death and becomes involved in political corruption. Incoherent and fragmented even by Godard's standards, and curiously titled, for the references to American culture aren't all that obvious (or scathing) besides the self-reflexive commentary on how the narrative is borrowed from Hollywood gangster films, or "a Disney film with Bogart". Karina has all the gorgeous charm in the world, but this is minor Godard all the same - though there remains a fantastic scene in a bar, with characters coming in and out of frame at will, with a short essay on language.
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Boz
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Post by Boz on Aug 8, 2006 19:57:46 GMT
The Last Temptation of Christ 1988/Scorsese An interesting picture, directed with trademark Scorsese flair, but it's still noticeably different in style than his work in the early 90's. A bit overlong, yes, and a bit difficult to follow for someone not too familiar with the story of Jesus, but still thought-provoking, still amazing to watch. It's strongest points lie in Scorsese's journey into Christ's thoughts, nightmares, visions, and fantasies. And wow, what a performance by Willem Dafoe, which went sadly un-nominated at the 88 Oscars.
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Boz
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Post by Boz on Aug 9, 2006 3:31:33 GMT
Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby 2006/McKay Not exactly laugh-a-minute like Anchorman, but still a solid comedy with Ferrel and the gang assuming new identities and some Southern accents. McKay experiments with some more daring camera techniques, including some CGI, which worked well. Great supporting cast here as well, Amy Adams, Gary Cole, Michael Clark Duncan, John C. Reilly, David Koechner, Sacha Baron Cohen, Molly Shannon, even Andy Richter. Very enjoyable.
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