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Joe Vitus |
Posted: Fri Nov 21, 2008 8:52 pm |
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Joined: 20 May 2004
Posts: 14498
Location: Houston
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Heh, heh, heh.
And you're right, they have great chemistry. This has such a huge impact on the scene that follows, and is what helps to make it so disturbing. How much of that is luck, I wonder, and how much of the casting was based on Hitchcock knowing what they could do in a scene together? |
_________________ You've got a great brain. You should keep it in your head.
-Topher |
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yambu |
Posted: Fri Nov 21, 2008 11:26 pm |
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Joined: 23 May 2004
Posts: 6441
Location: SF Bay Area
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billyweeds wrote: .....It does, however, feature one of Spacey's best perfs, and that's saying something. Billy, did you ever see Spacey in Bwy's The Iceman Cometh? I would have given anything. Anyone heard of a movie in the making? |
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gromit |
Posted: Sat Nov 22, 2008 3:10 am |
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Joined: 31 Aug 2004
Posts: 9010
Location: Shanghai
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I've been watching a bunch of Nikkatsu Studio films.
They were a B picture factory that cranked out a lot of exploitation films and basically invented the Pink genre in Japan. Mostly I watched a few Seijun Suzuki films. he's sort of a Japanese Samuel Fuller. I'll try to remark on those more later.
But for now, I'd rec Crazed Fruit, the 1956 film which basically ushered in the Japanese New Wave. It depicts the lustful teens with leisure time flirting and fighting and boating. A youth culture removed from the family and acting like Westerners (the horror). Though, as in Suzuki's films, Americans are looked down upon.
Like the French New Wave, it makes a virtue of its own low budget. It also takes on naturalistic and impressionistic aspects of Renoir. Unfortunately, the director Kô Nakahira, only 30 when this was made, kind of got absorbed and ground down in the studio system. I would like to see the one or two other films of his which are respected.
Btw, Crazed Fruit is part of the Criterion Collection, so should be available, netflixable, etc.
I should add that the Donald Ritchie commentary is very good on Japanese cinema and culture, and provides interesting details such as that the older brother in the film, Yûjirô Ishihara, became a big singing and movie star, married the female star of the film, and was the actual brother of the writer, who became mayor of Tokyo in 1999. |
_________________ Killing your enemies, if it's done badly, increases their number. |
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jeremy |
Posted: Sat Nov 22, 2008 5:16 pm |
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Joined: 21 May 2004
Posts: 6794
Location: Derby, England and Hamilton, New Zealand (yes they are about 12,000 miles apart)
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Does Young@Heart count as a documentary.
Unless Man On Wire is a clear eyed exploration of obsession, like the grizzly man thing, I'm not sure I'm really interested in this pointless guy's, pointless escapades. Sure every few years he makes for an interesting 30 seconds on the news, but....Aren't documentaries supposed to be about something.
It can't be right that Man On Wire could win the Oscar becuase he walked from the top of one tower to its twin. Surely, there are better testaments to those erect, God challenging monuments to mammon and the American Way so tragically felled on the 11th of the ninth. |
_________________ I am angry, I am ill, and I'm as ugly as sin.
My irritability keeps me alive and kicking.
I know the meaning of life, it doesn't help me a bit.
I know beauty and I know a good thing when I see it. |
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billyweeds |
Posted: Sat Nov 22, 2008 6:19 pm |
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Joined: 20 May 2004
Posts: 20618
Location: New York City
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jeremy wrote: Does Young@Heart count as a documentary.
Unless Man On Wire is a clear eyed exploration of obsession, like the grizzly man thing, I'm not sure I'm really interested in this pointless guy's, pointless escapades. Sure every few years he makes for an interesting 30 seconds on the news, but....Aren't documentaries supposed to be about something.
It can't be right that Man On Wire could win the Oscar becuase he walked from the top of one tower to its twin. Surely, there are better testaments to those erect, God challenging monuments to mammon and the American Way so tragically felled on the 11th of the ninth.
You seem almost hopelessly mired in a tunnel-visioned attitude toward the achievement. But seeing the movie just might change your mind. No, it's not just a record of a guy walking on a tightrope. There's much more there, but I'm not sure you're programmed to get it, to tell the truth. And it can't be summed up in a quick catchphrase, so don't ask. |
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jeremy |
Posted: Sat Nov 22, 2008 7:33 pm |
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Joined: 21 May 2004
Posts: 6794
Location: Derby, England and Hamilton, New Zealand (yes they are about 12,000 miles apart)
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Over the years I have become increasingly cynical and irritated with respect to a certain type of documentary built around a stunt or a showman. With scant material stertched over pre-determined time slot, they have all the tension of perished rubber band. They usually strike me as hopelessly fake because they are framed around the false premise that what we are watching is in any way meaningful or heroic. Their manufactured drama is particulalry risible: "Algernon and his team survey the weather reports. They need the wind to drop belwo 8m/s. It's good news, the strom front is predicted to pass later thisafternoon...he makes one last check of his equipment; one lose bolt or frayed rope and he could plunge to his death on the jagged rocks below."
Unseen, I accept that I may be doing Man On Wire a disservice. The context and framing are everything. For me, it would have been much more interesting if he'd managed to splatter his innards over half a Manhattan block. |
_________________ I am angry, I am ill, and I'm as ugly as sin.
My irritability keeps me alive and kicking.
I know the meaning of life, it doesn't help me a bit.
I know beauty and I know a good thing when I see it. |
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Joe Vitus |
Posted: Sat Nov 22, 2008 8:41 pm |
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Joined: 20 May 2004
Posts: 14498
Location: Houston
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Surely you can see why the story of someone whose innards weren't splattered all over the pavement of the World Trade Center, and who attempted to create something beatiful and celebratory on the site, might have emotional resonance for Americans. |
_________________ You've got a great brain. You should keep it in your head.
-Topher |
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jeremy |
Posted: Sat Nov 22, 2008 8:50 pm |
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Joined: 21 May 2004
Posts: 6794
Location: Derby, England and Hamilton, New Zealand (yes they are about 12,000 miles apart)
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Joe Vitus wrote: Surely you can see why the story of someone whose innards weren't splattered all over the pavement of the World Trade Center, and who attempted to create something beatiful and celebratory on the site, might have emotional resonance for Americans.
No, innards.
If the tone of the documentary is as you suggest, it may be worse than I feared. The guys just a circus act who set his wire high; where's the beauty and what's he celebrating apart from his own ego.
Maybe there's a cultural thing going on here, look what happened to David Blaine when he decided to starve himself in a perspex box over the Thames.
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=950CE5DA1F3BF936A2575AC0A9659C8B63 |
_________________ I am angry, I am ill, and I'm as ugly as sin.
My irritability keeps me alive and kicking.
I know the meaning of life, it doesn't help me a bit.
I know beauty and I know a good thing when I see it. |
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billyweeds |
Posted: Sat Nov 22, 2008 11:09 pm |
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Joined: 20 May 2004
Posts: 20618
Location: New York City
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Joe (and Jeremy)--I said it couldn't be summed up in a catchphrase, which is unfortunately what Joe attempted to do and got caught in Jeremy's innately unwelcoming trap. Petit was not just trying to create something beautiful, though it turned out that he did just that. He was more of a rebel than an artist, and the walk was more defiant than beauty-seeking. In other words, there were a bunch of reasons for the walk, and I submit that it's impossible to criticize the man or the movie without seeing it. |
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gromit |
Posted: Sat Nov 22, 2008 11:57 pm |
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Joined: 31 Aug 2004
Posts: 9010
Location: Shanghai
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I'm left wondering why a circus act can't be interesting and worthy of a doc. Seems to me that it's all about the personality, the motivation, the endurance, the technique and the beauty of pushing oneself. Let's see, human drama, yeah that seems worthy of a documentary. I'd watch a 90 minute doc on the French guy, dubbed Spiderman, who goes around the world climbing tall buildings with his hands (of course, it'd be pretty tough without them). |
_________________ Killing your enemies, if it's done badly, increases their number. |
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Joe Vitus |
Posted: Sun Nov 23, 2008 12:17 am |
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Joined: 20 May 2004
Posts: 14498
Location: Houston
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I find his whole definition about wanting to perform on the world's smallest stage, and in illuminating the space between the towers which people weren't noticing. Maybe my reaction comes from my own artistic intersets: having been in the theater from 10 until about 23, writing now, having been raised in part by a visual artist.
But I think it has an emotional resonance beyond that. Anyway, I thought you were right from the beginning, Billy, that it can't be summed up in a catchphrase. I just wanted to say something. |
_________________ You've got a great brain. You should keep it in your head.
-Topher |
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billyweeds |
Posted: Sun Nov 23, 2008 1:03 am |
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Joined: 20 May 2004
Posts: 20618
Location: New York City
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Joe Vitus wrote: I find his whole definition about wanting to perform on the world's smallest stage, and in illuminating the space between the towers which people weren't noticing. Maybe my reaction comes from my own artistic intersets: having been in the theater from 10 until about 23, writing now, having been raised in part by a visual artist.
But I think it has an emotional resonance beyond that. Anyway, I thought you were right from the beginning, Billy, that it can't be summed up in a catchphrase. I just wanted to say something.
And I appreciate your saying it. But Jeremy seems determined to prejudge it, for whatever reasons. |
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mo_flixx |
Posted: Sun Nov 23, 2008 10:37 am |
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Joined: 30 May 2004
Posts: 12533
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I finally saw "Cassandra's Dream." I'll have to go back to older posts here to read them.
"Cassandra's Dream" now makes it a trilogy for Woody Allen with his English films. Unless one wants to count Tom Wilkinson's speeches full of nervous tics, this film has _no_ comic elements.
I kept expecting a plot twist or two - something more involving the actress girlfriend perhaps - but no. This English tragedy owes a lot to _An American Tragedy_.
Like the other English films, this one is filled with wonderful locations and a great cast (Ewan MacGregor, Colin Ferrell, & Wilkinson).
Btw if this _is_ actually London (it's supposed to be), it looks like no part of London I've ever seen. |
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billyweeds |
Posted: Sun Nov 23, 2008 11:22 am |
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Joined: 20 May 2004
Posts: 20618
Location: New York City
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mo_flixx wrote: This English tragedy owes a lot to _An American Tragedy_.
Interesting you should say that about Cassandra's Dream, since Match Play was practically out-and-out plagiarized from An American Tragedy (or A Place in the Sun if you know it only from the movies). |
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yambu |
Posted: Sun Nov 23, 2008 12:40 pm |
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Joined: 23 May 2004
Posts: 6441
Location: SF Bay Area
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Wellll....loosely similar, in the sense they both deal, exquisitely, with justice delayed. |
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