Lancemc
Blue Crack Addict
Let's talk about books more in this thread.
Review the Movie You Viewed 10 (out of 10=Masterpiece)
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deep
Blue Crack Addict
those books are better than those movies
and if I was caught carrying a book like that in junior high, my friends would have beaten the hell out of me.
and if I was caught carrying a book like that in junior high, my friends would have beaten the hell out of me.
Fair enough. I'm done now.
Lancemc
Blue Crack Addict
White Material is an extraordinarily physical film. I've heard it referred to as Denis' "action film" and I think that's apt. Like all her films, it's about people in motion, in this case motivated by extreme life-or-death situations, on the personal and national, even human level. It's about race obviously, but also about a sort of intoxication that spreads from one group, from one person to another. Isabel Huppert stands as the core of the film, its heroine so to speak, a woman fighting to hold on to everything she's known as a part of her life in a land that fights just as hard to reject her. It's not entirely noble though, as much of her strength is fueled by stubbornness and a sense of superiority. She stands in contrast to the men around her - her fragile scuttling husband, pompous and deteriorating father-in-law, and "half-baked... incomplete" son who was born into this country that wants to expel him, eventually driving him to a sort of madness. We see the perspectives from all sides of the native African populations, the entire ensemble a swirling violent stew of incompatible souls, irreconcilable due to this intoxication perhaps, whatever it is? It's not something anyone has figured out, and Denis doesn't propose to try.
Denis' usual collaborator Agnes Godard is nearly missed here, her particular sensuality and entirely unique cinematic eye having proved invaluable to Denis' vision in the past. But new DP Yves Cape brings something to this particular landscape, one Denis has explored before in Chocolat and Beau Travail, to heighten its arid, violent and hauntingly beautiful atmosphere. Cinematographically and editorially it's still very much a Denis film - fractured, shimmering, elliptical and deconstructed. Narratively it's peculiar though, moving back and forth in chronology, which only amplifies the typical elliptical qualities of her work. Some of the filmmaking her is more classical in nature and less abstract, though the positive trade-off is a more frighteningly realistic layer to the piece. Still, her other vital collaborator Tindersticks provide one of the most evocative and memorable musical scores in recent memory. The beginning and ending sequences of the film, easily the most powerful, see the film's chronology more or less meeting itself again. The opening an unbelievable stretch of pure cinema, the finale an equally staggering collage of primal imagery and visceral human emotion. The final image shifts the film away from the "white material" and to back to the struggle, back to the land. It's fairly perfect.
Denis' usual collaborator Agnes Godard is nearly missed here, her particular sensuality and entirely unique cinematic eye having proved invaluable to Denis' vision in the past. But new DP Yves Cape brings something to this particular landscape, one Denis has explored before in Chocolat and Beau Travail, to heighten its arid, violent and hauntingly beautiful atmosphere. Cinematographically and editorially it's still very much a Denis film - fractured, shimmering, elliptical and deconstructed. Narratively it's peculiar though, moving back and forth in chronology, which only amplifies the typical elliptical qualities of her work. Some of the filmmaking her is more classical in nature and less abstract, though the positive trade-off is a more frighteningly realistic layer to the piece. Still, her other vital collaborator Tindersticks provide one of the most evocative and memorable musical scores in recent memory. The beginning and ending sequences of the film, easily the most powerful, see the film's chronology more or less meeting itself again. The opening an unbelievable stretch of pure cinema, the finale an equally staggering collage of primal imagery and visceral human emotion. The final image shifts the film away from the "white material" and to back to the struggle, back to the land. It's fairly perfect.
powerhour24
ONE love, blood, life
Stop hatin' on POA bono_212, I like you and all, but I might have to hurt you... by posting a 
smilie in reference to you!
The nerve of some people on discussion boards, having dissenting opinions and all,
.
smilie in reference to you!The nerve of some people on discussion boards, having dissenting opinions and all,
.
powerhour24
ONE love, blood, life
Clearly you didn't go to junior high at the same time as I did as pretty much everyone my age read them... and it was(that is, is) called middle school.
powerhour24
ONE love, blood, life
I was going to ask you (and you) Lance where you saw White Material as it has yet to surface around here, but then I noticed it opens in Boston on Friday... unfortunately it's at a theater I loathe... decisions.
you) Lance where you saw White Material as it has yet to surface around here, but then I noticed it opens in Boston on Friday... unfortunately it's at a theater I loathe... decisions.Stop hatin' on POA bono_212, I like you and all, but I might have to hurt you... by posting a
The nerve of some people on discussion boards, having dissenting opinions and all,
POA's my favorite Harry Potter book, so I guess I get a little defense
powerhour24
ONE love, blood, life
It's my favorite HP book too! Though maybe simply for sentimental reasons, realistically I think HBP and DH surpass it.
Lancemc
Blue Crack Addict
I was going to ask you (and
It just started on IFC On Demand cable services today, which is how I watched it. Honestly, I'd kill to see it in a theater though. Don't miss the chance.
powerhour24
ONE love, blood, life
I didn't realize it was on IFC On Demand thanks for the tip off, I may settle for that at first at the very least, you have no idea how much I don't enjoy this particular theater, getting there, the clientele, etc. If I feel particularly drawn to see it on the big screen after, I'll buck up... or hopefully it'll have come to a different arthouse by then.
Lancemc
Blue Crack Addict
God dammit. Just lost my entire Rivette review because of the forum's shit servers. Ugh, too dissuaded to rewrite anything tonight. Something brief tomorrow then.
OP
OP
lazarus
Blue Crack Supplier
I'm going to burn this fucking place down.
Lancemc
Blue Crack Addict
OK,
Celine and Julie Go Boating marks the start of my exploration into Rivette and his work. Killer way to start. A very fanciful or even fairy-tale sort of storytelling takes place in what's ostensibly a real-world setting, or at least a version of the world virtually identical to our on aside from the unusual characters and metaphysical happenings within it. It's clearly a story told by a cinephile himself, typical of La Nouvelle Vague creations, and one very much in line with the movements penchant for fracturing narratives and film language and reassembling them in new ways. A noteworthy different for me here, is how Rivette's film maintains a far more organic form than equally formally radical contemporaries like Godard or Resnais. A lot of that I feel has to do with the strong threads of humanism and even feminism in Rivette's work. It's exceedingly light-hearted and comical throughout, but the film has a great deal of empathy and affection for its characters, and the frequent sequences of vulnerability and emotion are never displaced.
Rivette's aesthetic is interesting. Carefully composed, he does great things with his film spaces and his characters' bodies, and things really take off when his handheld camera begins to roam as freely as its subjects. Great things with lighting as well, most notably with the courtly upstairs-downstairs drama the two women become engaged with. Again much of the film's formal brilliance lies in its editing, which can be as radical at times as any Godard film, but always imbued with meaning and inspiration. And of course I'd have to mention the final few scenes of the film, which give the piece a wholly unique shape, recalling numerous past details at once - the very final shot inverting the film back in itself, into a sort of cinematic mobius strip.
As for Duelle, the affair is far more elliptical and vague which has its appeal, though I feel it's a less impressive piece on the whole (I understand it's a part of an unfinished series, so I'll be sure to factor this film back in when I get further along the filmography). But regardless, my first film here set a pretty high bar. I do think Rivette's aesthetic methods reach for more interesting ideas here though. In his own words,
“To create one’s own space through the movements of one’s body, to occupy and traverse the spaces imposed by the décors and the camera’s field, to move and act within (and in relation to) the simultaneous musical space: these are the three parameters on which our actors are going to attempt to base their work.”
A daring approach to performance art and its cinematographic counterpart, the film was an incredibly evocative mood piece, the frame always roaming and mutating. I'm still mulling over what to make of its genre-riffing exploration of a made-up mythology, and as such really look forward to viewing Noroit and seeing the variation to the common theme. Still, as a somewhat abstract piece of art, Duelle impresses.
Celine and Julie Go Boating marks the start of my exploration into Rivette and his work. Killer way to start. A very fanciful or even fairy-tale sort of storytelling takes place in what's ostensibly a real-world setting, or at least a version of the world virtually identical to our on aside from the unusual characters and metaphysical happenings within it. It's clearly a story told by a cinephile himself, typical of La Nouvelle Vague creations, and one very much in line with the movements penchant for fracturing narratives and film language and reassembling them in new ways. A noteworthy different for me here, is how Rivette's film maintains a far more organic form than equally formally radical contemporaries like Godard or Resnais. A lot of that I feel has to do with the strong threads of humanism and even feminism in Rivette's work. It's exceedingly light-hearted and comical throughout, but the film has a great deal of empathy and affection for its characters, and the frequent sequences of vulnerability and emotion are never displaced.
Rivette's aesthetic is interesting. Carefully composed, he does great things with his film spaces and his characters' bodies, and things really take off when his handheld camera begins to roam as freely as its subjects. Great things with lighting as well, most notably with the courtly upstairs-downstairs drama the two women become engaged with. Again much of the film's formal brilliance lies in its editing, which can be as radical at times as any Godard film, but always imbued with meaning and inspiration. And of course I'd have to mention the final few scenes of the film, which give the piece a wholly unique shape, recalling numerous past details at once - the very final shot inverting the film back in itself, into a sort of cinematic mobius strip.
As for Duelle, the affair is far more elliptical and vague which has its appeal, though I feel it's a less impressive piece on the whole (I understand it's a part of an unfinished series, so I'll be sure to factor this film back in when I get further along the filmography). But regardless, my first film here set a pretty high bar. I do think Rivette's aesthetic methods reach for more interesting ideas here though. In his own words,
“To create one’s own space through the movements of one’s body, to occupy and traverse the spaces imposed by the décors and the camera’s field, to move and act within (and in relation to) the simultaneous musical space: these are the three parameters on which our actors are going to attempt to base their work.”
A daring approach to performance art and its cinematographic counterpart, the film was an incredibly evocative mood piece, the frame always roaming and mutating. I'm still mulling over what to make of its genre-riffing exploration of a made-up mythology, and as such really look forward to viewing Noroit and seeing the variation to the common theme. Still, as a somewhat abstract piece of art, Duelle impresses.
OP
OP
lazarus
Blue Crack Supplier
Bravo, sir. I would add that what separates Rivette from Resnais and Godard, in addition to the organic nature that you mentioned is that he's very much interested in dissecting the moviegoing experience, through the meta device of the girls "watching" their own story, but also by comparing film to theatre (something that comes up again and again). And instead of paying tribute to genre tropes from old films, he's more interested in recreating their mood or tone; the scene of the girls rollerskating while dressed like Irma Vep from Les Vampires isn't just a shout-out, but a direct acknowledgement of the major influence Louis Feuillade's work has on Rivetter overall, the "secret" Paris that's hiding just behind the real one.
How do you feel about David Lynch claiming to have never seen Céline and Julie? The similarities to Mulholland Drive are rather odd.
Don't remember what I said to watch next, but Pont du Nord has a lot in common with the two films you just watched and is another favorite of mine.
How do you feel about David Lynch claiming to have never seen Céline and Julie? The similarities to Mulholland Drive are rather odd.
Don't remember what I said to watch next, but Pont du Nord has a lot in common with the two films you just watched and is another favorite of mine.
purpleoscar
Rock n' Roll Doggie ALL ACCESS
The Social Network. 8/10. Very good movie. The ending line "You're not an asshole but you try too hard to be one" got some laughs. The strange thing is I don't feel like buying it. It's one of those movies where there are few sympathetic characters and you'll enjoy once but you don't have a burning passion to see it again.
I'm hoping that True Grit will be as good as some reviewers are saying.
I'm hoping that True Grit will be as good as some reviewers are saying.
Lancemc
Blue Crack Addict
The Tree of Life looks entirely stunning, impressionistic, cosmic, ethereal or maybe even surreal... Just OMG.
Oh also Black Swan was kind of maybe incredible.
Oh also Black Swan was kind of maybe incredible.
purpleoscar
Rock n' Roll Doggie ALL ACCESS
LMP
Blue Crack Supplier
The Searchers
It's hard to even begin discussing a film as monumentally loved and revered as The Searchers. Considered not only to be the finest film of both Ford and Wayne's careers, but also of the entire Western genre, it was hard to temper my expectations, something that I try to do going into any film. Well, whatever ideas of it I had going into the film were totally blown out of the water. Being my first pseudo-review on this page, I'll keep it brief.
Goddamn.
The first thing that leapt out to me was how well-photographed the film is. Shot in gorgeous Technicolor and the grandiose VistaVision, the landscapes of Monument Valley are captured with about as much clarity and vividness and one will ever see. Martin Scorsese considers VistaVision to be the greatest camera process ever used, mostly for its depth-of-field (with Ford uses to great effect both on the frontier and within the settlements) and scope. This was the first full film that I've watched on my new TV which looked awesome (a 42" 1080p Hitachi; thanks Black Friday), and naturally, I assume that this would be nearly immaculate to see on a full 35 mm film print.
The other key element of the film that's been beaten to death is John Wayne's performance and holy shit, I doubt that will stop anytime soon. A precursor to the many anti-heroes found in the films of New Hollywood, Wayne's Ethan Edwards has been ravaged by war and life in the previously idealized West, morphing him into a hateful and racist guy bound only by his singular moral code. Jeffrey Hunter's Martin serves as a foil and impressionable companion on the journey to recover his sister Debbie, also Edwards' niece. While he mostly tries to object Ethan's philosophies, the time spent looking for Debbie consumes years from his life, pushing him away from his love Laurie, paralleling the distance Ethan has always had with women. It's implied that Ethan had relations with his brother's wife, which puts his entire journey into a whole new context. Ethan's psychology: his thoughts on independence, family and those goddamned Comanche Indians, are at the film's emotional and thematic core, which combined with Ford's grand film grammar (emphasis on the master shot and movement, sporadic use of close-up) give the audience a refreshing take on both the romanticism and corruptibility of man's view of The West.
You could make the argument that the Western is the most American genre in all of cinema and Ford the most American of storytellers. His films served as part of the basis for Truffaut's auteur theory and a tremendous influence on luminaries like Akira Kurosawa. This genre and Ford's body of work have been a big blind spot to me in my further exploration of cinema and interests, and I'm glad to have exposed myself to this and Stagecoach earlier in the year. I'll certainly be making a stronger effort to check out more of his films in the near future. For now, I'll be satisfied with this.
It's hard to even begin discussing a film as monumentally loved and revered as The Searchers. Considered not only to be the finest film of both Ford and Wayne's careers, but also of the entire Western genre, it was hard to temper my expectations, something that I try to do going into any film. Well, whatever ideas of it I had going into the film were totally blown out of the water. Being my first pseudo-review on this page, I'll keep it brief.
Goddamn.
The first thing that leapt out to me was how well-photographed the film is. Shot in gorgeous Technicolor and the grandiose VistaVision, the landscapes of Monument Valley are captured with about as much clarity and vividness and one will ever see. Martin Scorsese considers VistaVision to be the greatest camera process ever used, mostly for its depth-of-field (with Ford uses to great effect both on the frontier and within the settlements) and scope. This was the first full film that I've watched on my new TV which looked awesome (a 42" 1080p Hitachi; thanks Black Friday), and naturally, I assume that this would be nearly immaculate to see on a full 35 mm film print.
The other key element of the film that's been beaten to death is John Wayne's performance and holy shit, I doubt that will stop anytime soon. A precursor to the many anti-heroes found in the films of New Hollywood, Wayne's Ethan Edwards has been ravaged by war and life in the previously idealized West, morphing him into a hateful and racist guy bound only by his singular moral code. Jeffrey Hunter's Martin serves as a foil and impressionable companion on the journey to recover his sister Debbie, also Edwards' niece. While he mostly tries to object Ethan's philosophies, the time spent looking for Debbie consumes years from his life, pushing him away from his love Laurie, paralleling the distance Ethan has always had with women. It's implied that Ethan had relations with his brother's wife, which puts his entire journey into a whole new context. Ethan's psychology: his thoughts on independence, family and those goddamned Comanche Indians, are at the film's emotional and thematic core, which combined with Ford's grand film grammar (emphasis on the master shot and movement, sporadic use of close-up) give the audience a refreshing take on both the romanticism and corruptibility of man's view of The West.
You could make the argument that the Western is the most American genre in all of cinema and Ford the most American of storytellers. His films served as part of the basis for Truffaut's auteur theory and a tremendous influence on luminaries like Akira Kurosawa. This genre and Ford's body of work have been a big blind spot to me in my further exploration of cinema and interests, and I'm glad to have exposed myself to this and Stagecoach earlier in the year. I'll certainly be making a stronger effort to check out more of his films in the near future. For now, I'll be satisfied with this.
purpleoscar
Rock n' Roll Doggie ALL ACCESS
The Searchers is great. The ending is very moving. Well shot, well acted. Classic!
Lancemc
Blue Crack Addict
Good job YLB. Probably the best classical American Western ever made.
OP
OP
lazarus
Blue Crack Supplier
I'd suggest checking out She Wore A Yellow Ribbon next. It's not in 'scope, but the color photography is great, and it features a completely different but equally impressive Wayne performance, and noteworthy for how much older the character was than the actor himself. Very subtle and arguably his most moving turn.
From there, you could check out the other two films in the "Cavalry trilogy" (Fort Apache and Rio Grande), or go for another masterpiece like My Darling Clementine.
From there, you could check out the other two films in the "Cavalry trilogy" (Fort Apache and Rio Grande), or go for another masterpiece like My Darling Clementine.
purpleoscar
Rock n' Roll Doggie ALL ACCESS
Rabbit Hole 7.5/10 Decent movie about the loss of a child. Most of it was realistic enough, and the performances of the two leads are good. It could get a couple of nominations.
LMP
Blue Crack Supplier
Thanks for the recs, I was feeling a little overwhelmed on where to go next. The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance was the first to come to mind.
purpleoscar
Rock n' Roll Doggie ALL ACCESS
Winter's Bone 7/10
Well acted movie about a girl trying to keep her family together despite the possibility of losing her house. Some of the plot is a little too neat and there is a more than passing resemblance to Frozen River with Melissa Leo but it's worth a look if you like Frozen River.
Well acted movie about a girl trying to keep her family together despite the possibility of losing her house. Some of the plot is a little too neat and there is a more than passing resemblance to Frozen River with Melissa Leo but it's worth a look if you like Frozen River.
OP
OP
lazarus
Blue Crack Supplier
That is a great one too. But I'd watch more of the classics before the rest of the myth-deconstructing ones. Better context. If you haven't seen Stagecoach yet, I'd make it a number one priority.
LMP
Blue Crack Supplier
Stagecoach was my first. Holy shit.
Lancemc
Blue Crack Addict
When is Laz getting his ass to Black Swan? Is what I want to know.
OP
OP
lazarus
Blue Crack Supplier
Finally opened this weekend at a theatre I don't want to burn down. But I'm working today, so prob a matinee tomorrow.
But I'm worried that White Material won't last another week so I'm torn.
But I'm worried that White Material won't last another week so I'm torn.
Lancemc
Blue Crack Addict
Ah. Well, I don't know how big a Denis fan you are, but regardless White Material is probably best viewed in a theater, so I wouldn't pass that up. And Black Swan will surely be around in the city for a while still.
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