Top 5 Filmmakers

[Kino]

Apr 10, 2008 5:54:21 GMT seyfried said:

The "why" part takes a while...OK, not really, but I'll just go one category at a time (skipping the first category because I'm such a pain in the ass).

Currently Working

(Firstly, if we're doing this by recent body of work Scorsese wouldn't make the list; he does based on the entire resume, but for the sake of redundancy I'll exclude him. Also, this is in no way, shape, or form a definitive list.)

David Lynch. He's said film is dead...for him. (Whew. He's not Godard.) Fine. And while I think the "sense of liberation" that he claims digital is giving him is great and all there's a sense of something lost in the transmission that I think he might not ever be able to get back ("the 50s are still here...they never went away"...hauntological enough for you?) Nevertheless, I still think he's one of the few, if not the only to really tap deep into the language, the syntax, of cinema - then again, maybe if Antonin Artaud would have stayed around longer to fulfill his "prophecy" we'd have another. As another member here put it, he's "working on instinct a lot of the time" and it's not just that, but he's making art in a way that's built of instincts and cognition. Perhaps, what's doomed to lost is the craft of his work, as if digital technology and all its great sense of liberty and directness will lose the fact that he's still having to compose all of this and work within such deliberate limitations. I just wonder if he'll work as hard - which is probably an awful thing to say given that no director works harder. But I'm rambling, and if I had to make some fucking unique point here (or at least try to) it would be his sound. And I don't just mean the dense milieu. I mean his use of music as "sympton" or sinthome, really (the true meaning is loss in the English translation, dammit). In Blue Velvet you get the common praise in stuff like.."well, In Dreams was great...juxtaposing the violence and dreaminess...and the small-town Americana feel". Yeah, you do, but in Lynch's film music is used to perpetuate characters out of stasis, in the case of Frank it's him lip-syncing words reinterpreting the words for aggression, furthermore recalling Ketty Lester's Love Letters and reinterpreting it for the sake. In these cases, music functions as an element not impervious to the actors - as most films do. Often (and you'll see this anytime you watch a special feature or documentary on his sets) Lynch has his actors perform under the music, and even when not so, it's clear that he's directing more from the feel and cadences inherent to the soundtrack rather than tacking it on in post-production. In the case of Lost Highway, we begin to hear This Mortal Coil’s "Song to the Siren," but the song is cut off and replace by musical sound effects when Fred is unable to perform sexually. The song later appears when the more potent, "attractive" Fred is able to satisfy his sexual yearnings and perform. I'm rambling again, and there's a bit more clarity to be made with the Lacan readings...but moving on....


David Cronenberg I like his new stuff almost in the way I like Mann's new stuff: it doesn't preach. I'm not saying that the majority of their earlier films did it, but in the case of something like Videodrome, its early overstatedness doesn't actual feel particularly useful. He's such a master of tone and style, and these little sharp ends that poked out in his earlier films have been used by him in his recent films. Call them performativism, call them reactions to the death of irony or 9/11, but I think he's making post-film within film. And for that matter, going beyond meta-genre to something more. He's denying agency left and right for his heroes and heroines, and he's telling it with such a flat style that audiences were forced to take him seriously. I think he's going places...again.

Michael Mann

I'm sick of talking about him at the moment. And frankly, if he makes his films like Miami Vice from here on out...he's going to make a lot of people really unhappy. And that's hot. I love how people are obsessed with their jobs in his films (trying to say something there, Mike?). I love how their only way of negotiating this problem is by suppressing it even more. And that, just like everything that wants out -- love, escapism, etc - ...they get out. And want a picture that says a thousand words, well here you go:




Alfonso Cuaron

I saw Zizek's commentary on the Children of Men dvd and I was sold like never before. I mean, I had really loved the film, but had vehemently defended mostly its cinematic elements rather than its texture. But nevertheless, Y Tu Mama Tambien film will always be my favorite. And for my money, nobody's ever made a better Harry Potter film. He's a pupil of the Bunuel film school, and if you see his early films you can see bits and pieces...but he's always been more of an idealist than satirical. And he's always capable of coaxing a level of poignancy with formal elements of film that few modern directors are even trying. He's one of the few that does the long take not just because it looks cool but because it works.

Brian DePalma

Eh, everybody always hears too much about him....I'll cheat and do one more.

Sofia Coppola

Instead of shaking the nepotism, she took it head on with Marie Antoinette. And while I think she slaps us in the face with a few of the anachronisms, I'll never have to apologize for Lost in Translation. How gorgeous of a film is that?

I also like Europeans and Asians...I swear!

Wow. I really appreciate the effort. You are the FCM Member of the Week for this post!

Really looking forward to seeing your other choices.

re: Lynch's sound design and use of sound/music/song
Agreed. That aspect of his work should be mentioned as much as his visual sense and "weirdness" (a term often used by people).

[RNL]

I'm bumping Natali for Ramsay.

So,

5 Under 40:

Apichatpong Weerasethakul ()
Zhang-ke Jia (24 City)
Lynne Ramsay (We Need to Talk About Kevin)
Paul Thomas Anderson ()
Carlos Reygadas ()

[seyfried]

I'll probably just list my five all-time (not including the working ones) and anybody wanting an explanation can just ask. Btw, wetdog, was surprised to Apichatpong Weerasethakul was so young...guess I just figured he was, well, older. Anyway:

Alain Resnais (he's still working, so I cheated) Best Film: Hiroshima Mon Amour
Kenji Mizoguchi Best film: Life of Oharu or Ugetsu
Stanley Kubrick Best film: I could give six, writing about The Shining is a current obsession, though.
Alfred Hitchcock Best film: Vertigo and Marnie
Tarkovsky Best film: Stalker or Nostalghia

[Kino]

seyfried, this is the last thing I'll ask of you in this thread, I swear!

If you can, who are your choices for:

To emerge in the last decade or so (most promising)

Earlier I asked wetdog to elaborate on what he meant and he said, "I meant since the mid-'90s, but I deliberately left it open to interpretation. And by 'emerge' I meant come to some kind of notable attention... and take that to mean whatever you will."

I'd like to know if there're filmmakers that I should particularly look out for that I'm already not.

Saying "why" isn't necessary.

Thanks.

[seyfried]

I think people here have covered more angles than I can ever dream of regarding that topic; making an original choice would be particularly difficult. So some fleeting thoughts:

I haven't seen Satoshi Kon mentioned so, that's a quick-pick.
Everybody might be quick to point out Sokurov's emergence, but I think he was making his best films in the early 90s.
If anybody gets a chance check out José Luis Guerín's latest work for some of the best spectral POV-work since Altman's The Last Goodbye.
Todd Solondz needs to tweak a few things, but other than that, I think he's phenomenal. Same with Chan-wook Park. I hear Casting a Glance is underrated -- well, fuck, so is James Benning. And here's something funny...in the middle of Rob Zombie's Halloween there's a lingering shot of dirty candy corn sitting on a fireplace mantle. And it hit me. He's re-envisioning horror through the already horrified stains of white-trash America...imagine my surprise when all those angles had already been covered by about 30 blogs out there (the trash-collage poster should have been the giveaway). Damn. I'm not saying he's worth more than a glance, but put him next to a Todd Solondz screenplay mixed with the despondent lyricism of someone like Cormac McCarthy and you've got one hell of a Film-Philosophy Journal paper. Just a thought. And speaking of horror, how about Danny Boyle? His Sunshine, next to the Coen's flick and moments of Anderson's, was perhaps the most fulfilling cinematic experience of last year. And speaking of Oscar-winners, how about Ang Lee? Oh, wait, he's selling himself to the devil with A Little Game, I hear. Ki-duk Kim's a good shout-out, btw; I think somebody already got him. Of course, none of this makes much sense because in due time, all our stars will be watched through Youtube, right?

[Kino]

Thanks for that, though, would've been nice to see your choices regardless of who was already mentioned and who wasn't.

Yeah, read about Guerin, and City of Sylvia made a couple of 2007 top-tens.

Would love to see Benning's work. There's a whole lotta experimental film that I have yet to see. Kills me that I've only seen one Michael Snow and I don't even know if what I saw was Wavelength in its entirety (Google Video).

The big screen will never die even if it's smaller multiplexes with less moviegoers and just art/revival houses in the future.

[svsg]

Apr 11, 2008 19:36:14 GMT seyfried said:

Of course, none of this makes much sense because in due time, all our stars will be watched through Youtube, right?

How does everybody here see the youtube/cellphone trend projected for the future? I think it is VERY important to discuss this. I am saddened from a surface look at the issue. I haven't thought much about the issue, but somehow it looks like cinema as an art form will soon be reduced to making clever/funny/cool stuff with video. All the youtube stuff people forward each other are like "this is the coolest thing on you tube... you must watch this" .......... Will there be contemplation, philosophy, visual statements on life, art, etc? I would love to hear your thoughts about this.

[svsg]

Apr 11, 2008 19:47:28 GMT Kino said:

The big screen will never die even if it's smaller multiplexes with less moviegoers and just art/revival houses in the future.

Eventhough there is a dedicated or even a slightly increasing audience for plays/theater, I don't see it as popular as cinema is today. Hopefully cinema doesn't get reduced to that in the future.

[Kino]

Apr 11, 2008 19:53:07 GMT @svsg said:

How does everybody here see the youtube/cellphone trend projected for the future? I think it is VERY important to discuss this. I am saddened from a surface look at the issue. I haven't thought much about the issue, but somehow it looks like cinema as an art form will soon be reduced to making clever/funny/cool stuff with video.

I don't see this as a problem. I don't think the line would be blurred so much.

Will there be contemplation, philosophy, visual statements on life, art, etc?

Yes, because interpretive literary criticism begins to be taught around middle-school age. While the record company infrastructure is being challenged by digital self-distribution, people still find meaning, philosophy, statements, and commentary in music. Within that context, I don't see why more than a handful of people wouldn't have a similar approach to moviegoing and filmmaking despite the viral video culture.

Speaking of music and movies. I've noticed on other music message boards and real-life instances that some music buffs don't delve deeply into film as they do music. I mean if music buffs realize that there's more to music than Top 40 radio stations and music video television then why don't they think there's more to movies than the movies that get the most advertisement on tv? Some avoid b&w movies like it's the plague.

[RNL]

I too am puzzled by the high instance of extremely conservative attitudes toward cinema among people with extremely eclectic, self-shaped and self-satiated (because non-mainstream) tastes in, and a great passion for, music. Sentence ends.

Is it the democratization of music? Was it the Soundclick/MySpace/Napster revolution?

Music occupies a very different cultural space.

And of course music is something entirely different to cinema.

[Kino]

Wetdog, has Tsai entered your Top 5 currently working directors?

[RNL]

Hells yes.

At #1.

I'll update my original lists.

[svsg]

Mar 21, 2008 5:00:40 GMT @svsg said:

I am not in favor of sorting or slotting them based on some criterion.

My favorites (in no order)
Aronofsky, Darren
Coppola, Francis Ford
Fellini, Federico
Hitchcock, Alfred
Ray, Satyajit
Tarr, Béla
Wong Kar-wai


Runners up
Jarmusch, Jim
Tarkovsky, Andrei


I badly want to explore these filmmakers
Jodorowsky, Alejandro
Pasolini, Pier Paolo

My fresh list of top favorites:
Michelangelo Antonioni
Alain Resnais
Hitchcock, Alfred
Ray, Satyajit
Tarr, Béla

Runners up:
Aronofsky, Darren
Coppola, Francis Ford
Wong Kar-wai
Jarmusch, Jim
Tarkovsky, Andrei

[Capo]

Malick
Haneke
Ceylan
Apichatpong
Denis

[Capo]

Spreading out from this thread, who would make your world list of contemporary great filmmakers?

[svsg]

Only Wong (from my top5 list) and Aronofsky(from my runner up list) seem to be the only ones still making movies. However, I have seen one great movie from a bunch of Asian directors (my recent reviews). If I see a few more quality works from them, any of them could potentially be in my top 5 or top 10.

[Blib]

These are the top 5 directors I'm most interested in seeing more of:

David Lynch
Jean-Pierre Melville
Akira Kurosawa
Kar Wai Wong
Alfred Hitchcock

[svsg]

Satyajit Ray
Yasujiro Ozu
Michaelangelo Antonioni