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| Joe Vitus |
 Posted: Fri Jan 02, 2009 5:21 am |
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Joined: 20 May 2004
Posts: 14498
Location: Houston
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mo_flixx wrote: The clip of Judy makes you wonder why she was forever given such a hard time about her appearance. She looks radiant.
Heavy diet, fake nose, airbrush photos, lots of makeup, and Hollywood technicolor.
Judy Garland was an amazing talent. She could do it all: sing, dance, act. But she was not a naturally attractive woman in the traditional sense. Nor did she need to be. |
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You've got a great brain. You should keep it in your head.
-Topher |
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| jeremy |
| Posted: Fri Jan 02, 2009 9:37 am |
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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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It's enough to make one dress in gingham and join a parade.
And while we're on the subject:
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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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| lissa |
| Posted: Fri Jan 02, 2009 9:50 am |
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Joined: 20 May 2004
Posts: 2148
Location: my computer
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Syd:
Quote: On the other hand, sappy love ballads sound much better if you sing them like Elmer Fudd.
You're right...no one can quite capture my heart till they sing to me à la Elmer. *swoons*
Rod - that dialogue is a RIOT!
Wade - I can come into The Wizard of Oz just at the part where she is saying goodbye to the threesome, and it's instant tears for me. I LOVE that film and own the DVD. Classic is too mild a word for that movie! |
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Statistically, 6 out of 7 dwarfs aren't happy. |
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| billyweeds |
| Posted: Fri Jan 02, 2009 9:57 am |
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Joined: 20 May 2004
Posts: 20618
Location: New York City
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| Despite having performed in an international tour of The Wizard of Oz, and loving the score and the performances, I can never quite join the chorus of superlatives. There's just too slack a pace in the second half, and "If I Were King of the Forest" has never that grabbed me all that much. It's definitely a very fine movie and a classic, but (IMO) far from perfection. |
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| Rod |
| Posted: Fri Jan 02, 2009 10:14 am |
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Joined: 21 Dec 2004
Posts: 2944
Location: Lithgow, Australia
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| Party on, Lissa. |
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A long time ago, but somehow in the future...It is a period of civil war and renegade paragraphs floating through space. |
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| lshap |
| Posted: Fri Jan 02, 2009 10:34 am |
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Site Admin
Joined: 12 May 2004
Posts: 4248
Location: Montreal
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In the center of The Curious Case Of Benjamin Button lies a big hole where my empathy should have been. It's a sprawling mammoth of a movie with some great actors, top-notch photography and music, but the sum of its wonderful parts never coalesced. Why? Probably because the central character never became more than the sum of his gimmick. Benjamin Button is born sick and elderly, and ages backwards towards middle-age, youth and, finally, infancy. It's an interesting "What-if?" conversational piece. What it's NOT is a strong story with a great main character.
I say this with a degree of sadness because I really wanted to like this film. But despite every attempt by some talented people to layer this fairy-tale with meaning and an emotional arc, the story of Benjamin Button is more about what he looks like than what he feels like.
As the film continues and Button simultaneously ages and 'youths', more of my brain was engaged with the math than the character. He looks 90 but he's really newborn; now he's 60-ish but really a teen; now he's 40-ish and really...uh...40-ish. Brad Pitt plays the part as well as possible, and extraordinary makeup enhances the weirdness of his reverse chronology. But it's a paradox of physical form, not substance. Yes, there's a wrinkly-boy-meets-girl subplot that's intended to warm up the special effects, and Pitt and Cate Blanchet make a good onscreen couple, but rather than enhance their romance, Button's de-aging just confuses it. I get it - he's a man-out-of-time, but unlike other misanthropes like the Elephant Man or Forrest Gump, Button's condition is neither real nor progressive. Despite the weirdness of being the world's oldest-looking teenager, he doesn't actually do anything that cool, nor does he learn anything that profound along the way.
Benjamin Button is just an odd-looking guy, which, in the end, makes his case not curious enough. |
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| lshap |
| Posted: Fri Jan 02, 2009 10:54 am |
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Site Admin
Joined: 12 May 2004
Posts: 4248
Location: Montreal
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billyweeds wrote: Despite having performed in an international tour of The Wizard of Oz, and loving the score and the performances, I can never quite join the chorus of superlatives. There's just too slack a pace in the second half, and "If I Were King of the Forest" has never that grabbed me all that much. It's definitely a very fine movie and a classic, but (IMO) far from perfection.
I agree "If I Were King of the Forest" isn't the strongest piece, but the overall score is great. And so damn simple!
Strongest pieces? Well, aside from the obvious Rainbow thing, and the perfect singability of "If I Only Had a Brain", I'd say the entire medley of tunes when Dorothy lands in Munchkinland - from "Come Out, come out..." to "We welcome you to Munchkinland, fa-lalalalala, lalala..." is probably one of the greatest overall scenes in film.
I did the musical direction for a kids play two years ago, and the director wanted me to write additional tunes for the witch and her henchmen. Additional tunes? For The Wizard of Oz? You're kidding, right? One of the numbers I came up with was pretty catchy. It was based on the "Oh-Way-ooo.....WAY-oooo" marching chant, and worked well 'cause it stayed within the spirit of the source material. But the idea of my compositions next to Arlen's was terrifying. |
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| marantzo |
| Posted: Fri Jan 02, 2009 11:24 am |
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Quote: ... but unlike other misanthropes like the Elephant Man or Forrest Gump...
Are you saying that those two movies are misanthropic, or that the characters are? I can't understand what you mean in either case. |
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| lady wakasa |
| Posted: Fri Jan 02, 2009 11:27 am |
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Joined: 21 May 2004
Posts: 5911
Location: Beyond the Blue Horizon
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lshap wrote: Benjamin Button is just an odd-looking guy, which, in the end, makes his case not curious enough.
Although I haven't seen the movie, I have to agree generally with your review, lorne. When I've seen the reverse aging schtick used successfully, it acts as a hook but there's much more going on behind that. It's equivalent to some of the concerns raised about CGI-heavy films: the pretty can't substitute for a story.
...I guess I'm just not curious enough to go see Benjamin Button. |
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| marantzo |
| Posted: Fri Jan 02, 2009 11:27 am |
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| Lorne, your thoughts about Button are shared by a lot of critics. I haven't seen it and don't plan to. Which is convenient, because I swore off Fincher movies after I saw Seven. |
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| Trish |
| Posted: Fri Jan 02, 2009 12:14 pm |
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Joined: 21 May 2004
Posts: 2438
Location: Massachusetts
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Has anyone seen Revolutionary Road?
I know its only been released in a a few theatres but I thought one of you big city folks might have caught it. |
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| lady wakasa |
| Posted: Fri Jan 02, 2009 1:01 pm |
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Joined: 21 May 2004
Posts: 5911
Location: Beyond the Blue Horizon
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| gromit |
| Posted: Fri Jan 02, 2009 1:08 pm |
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Joined: 31 Aug 2004
Posts: 9010
Location: Shanghai
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Trish wrote: Has anyone seen Revolutionary Road?
I can pick it up and give it some eyetime.
Screener dvd's make the world go round. |
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Killing your enemies, if it's done badly, increases their number. |
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| Syd |
| Posted: Fri Jan 02, 2009 1:12 pm |
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Site Admin
Joined: 21 May 2004
Posts: 12921
Location: Norman, Oklahoma
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lady wakasa wrote: Not I. Only theater film I've seen lately is Slumdog Millionaire.
Nor I. The only one I've seen lately is Doubt. The theatre seems very adept at showing movies I don't want to see. |
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I had a love and my love was true but I lost my love to the yabba dabba doo, --The Flintstone Lament |
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| lissa |
| Posted: Fri Jan 02, 2009 1:18 pm |
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Joined: 20 May 2004
Posts: 2148
Location: my computer
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I'm on the bandwagon with the lack of enthusiasm for "If I Were King of the Forest". However, Nathan Lane, in a charity production of the film, did it with incredible panache. The best line: "If I were king of the forest...not queen, not duke, not prince. Not even the artist formerly KNOWN as Prince."
It's a gem. |
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Statistically, 6 out of 7 dwarfs aren't happy. |
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