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| Marc |
 Posted: Mon Oct 19, 2009 6:22 pm |
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Joined: 19 May 2004
Posts: 8424
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I saw HUSBANDS when it was released in 1970. I was 19. It was one of those life changing films for me. I have to re-view it in order to tell you all the reasons it had an impact on me. Certainly a major reason was that I'd never seen men of my father's generation depicted with such rawness. These men were emotional basket cases and they let it all hang out in the film. It was an eye opener. My father was a very self-contained (repressed?) and emotionally distant man when I was growing up. He was a military officer who gave decorum and discipline a lot of weight. So, to see Gazzara, Cassavetes and Falk spewing their guts all over the screen was weirdly exhilarating. Aha, grownups can be as screwed up as teenagers. Cassavetes may have been self-indulgent and enabled his actors to be the same, but in their dramatic experiments there was a lot of truth being revealed. As the world was changing around them (the hippie thing had gone mainstream), these men (the characters in HUSANDS) were grappling with their souls and didn't know exactly what that meant.
I recently read a very good biography of Cassavetes, ACCIDENTAL GENIUS,
and it confirmed what I already knew: Cassavetes was flying by the seat of his pants, he was very instinctual, he was intelligent but not an intellectual, he was passionate and driven. He relied heavily on improvisation and trusted his actors. He was a heavy drinker but a disciplined artist. He was a pioneer. Yes, his films seem somewhat dated today, but that is because he influenced so many film makers over the past 5 decades, including much of the French nouvelle vague. You see his influence in the work of Mike Leigh, Tarantino, Woody Allen, Soderbergh, and practically every independent film maker since Sex, Lies and Videotape rocked Sundance in 1989. |
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| marantzo |
| Posted: Mon Oct 19, 2009 6:59 pm |
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| I haven't seen Husbands, but I can understand the affect it had on you by your description of the core of the movie. |
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| marantzo |
| Posted: Mon Oct 19, 2009 7:08 pm |
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| Since Husbands was released in 1970, that couldn't have been the movie that they were discussing, because I was hacking in '72, '73 so it would probably have been A Woman Under the Influence. |
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| Joe Vitus |
| Posted: Mon Oct 19, 2009 7:32 pm |
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Joined: 20 May 2004
Posts: 14498
Location: Houston
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| Charity is, of course, not a prostitute. Cabiria, the character in the Fellini film was. Charity was a taxi-dancer. |
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| lady wakasa |
| Posted: Mon Oct 19, 2009 9:10 pm |
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Joined: 21 May 2004
Posts: 5911
Location: Beyond the Blue Horizon
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Joe Vitus wrote: Charity is, of course, not a prostitute. Cabiria, the character in the Fellini film was. Charity was a taxi-dancer.
I don't think that would've made a difference in Whiskey's high school, though... %^O |
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| billyweeds |
| Posted: Mon Oct 19, 2009 9:39 pm |
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Joined: 20 May 2004
Posts: 20618
Location: New York City
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Did a de facto double feature this afternoon/evening of Paranormal Activity and A Serious Man. PA was scary enough to be worthwhile, but not so scary as to be really disturbing. In other words, I enjoyed it without having my world shaken.
A Serious Man, on the other hand, is the first Coen Brothers movie I've seen that is a serious possibility for taking the #1 position away from Fargo. It's funny--sometimes fall-out-of-your-seat funny--and horrifying, and very, deeply sad. More later. |
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| Joe Vitus |
| Posted: Mon Oct 19, 2009 11:09 pm |
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Joined: 20 May 2004
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Location: Houston
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Billy,
Tell me again what you thought of Blair Witch before I decide if I should see PA. |
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| billyweeds |
| Posted: Mon Oct 19, 2009 11:31 pm |
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Joined: 20 May 2004
Posts: 20618
Location: New York City
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| The fact that I liked Blair Witch shouldn't make you decide whether or not to see Paranormal Activity. Though they are similar, Paranormal is much more artistically directed and acted, and has a much surer hand in general. The pace is everything in PA, and it's disciplined and professional. Blair Witch was a student film that got lucky because it played--effectively, I thought--on primal and universal fears of the forest at night. I think Oren Peli, the director of PA, has a real future. It's a good movie that successfully creeped me out through its artistic choices. Of the three horror movies with "found footage"--Blair Witch, Cloverfield, and PA--Paranormal Activity is definitely the best. |
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| billyweeds |
| Posted: Mon Oct 19, 2009 11:33 pm |
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Joined: 20 May 2004
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Location: New York City
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| Michael Stuhlbarg, the lead in A Serious Man, gives a sensational performance, one of the best of the year. The Coens' direction is perhaps the best work they've ever done. The movie is their best since Fargo, with not a wasted frame or a single moment that is less than riveting. It's a masterpiece. |
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| Joe Vitus |
| Posted: Mon Oct 19, 2009 11:40 pm |
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billyweeds wrote: The fact that I liked Blair Witch shouldn't make you decide whether or not to see Paranormal Activity. Though they are similar, Paranormal is much more artistically directed and acted, and has a much surer hand in general. The pace is everything in PA, and it's disciplined and professional. Blair Witch was a student film that got lucky because it played--effectively, I thought--on primal and universal fears of the forest at night. I think Oren Peli, the director of PA, has a real future. It's a good movie that successfully creeped me out through its artistic choices. Of the three horror movies with "found footage"--Blair Witch, Cloverfield, and PA--Paranormal Activity is definitely the best.
Good point about the apples and oranges of the two. Will check it out. |
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| billyweeds |
| Posted: Mon Oct 19, 2009 11:50 pm |
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Joined: 20 May 2004
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Location: New York City
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Back to A Serious Man. In addition to Michael Stuhlbarg, whose performance in the Job-like leading role roots, carries, and lands the movie, there are many more performances which are among the best in their various categories for 2009. Richard Kind, as Stuhlbarg's loser brother, and Fred Malemed, as Stuhlbarg's wife's boyfriend, make unforgettable characters out of quite small though wonderfully well written roles. Sari Lennick as the wife finds layers upon layers in what might have been a cruel, misogynist cliche. And Amy Landecker, as the next-door-neighbor who sunbathes nude and smokes marijuana (the film is set in 1968), is hysterically funny and sexy as well, with one of the best deadpans since Buster Keaton.
This movie will haunt me for days--at least.
One critic points out that the Coens are on a roll, with three excellent features in a row--No Country for Old Men, Burn After Reading, and now (IMO) the capper, A Serious Man. |
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| Marj |
| Posted: Tue Oct 20, 2009 12:06 am |
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Joined: 21 May 2004
Posts: 10497
Location: Manhattan
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billyweeds wrote:
This movie will haunt me for days--at least.
One critic points out that the Coens are on a roll, with three excellent features in a row--No Country for Old Men, Burn After Reading, and now (IMO) the capper, A Serious Man.
I absolutely love when that happens. Enjoy, Billy. It really happens so rarely. |
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| lissa |
| Posted: Tue Oct 20, 2009 6:28 am |
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Joined: 20 May 2004
Posts: 2148
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I'm actually not paying too much attention to plot and setting of Paranormal Activity so I can't speak from that perspective. But one of the main talking points comparing it to Blair Witch is the micro-budget==>mega-profit angle. In that respect, they're making waves.
I was shanghai'd to Blair Witch when it came out; not my choice of genre. I'd sleep with a light on for a year... |
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| billyweeds |
| Posted: Tue Oct 20, 2009 7:15 am |
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Joined: 20 May 2004
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Location: New York City
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lissa wrote: I'm actually not paying too much attention to plot and setting of Paranormal Activity so I can't speak from that perspective. But one of the main talking points comparing it to Blair Witch is the micro-budget==>mega-profit angle. In that respect, they're making waves.
I was shanghai'd to Blair Witch when it came out; not my choice of genre. I'd sleep with a light on for a year...
lissa--No way in this world or any other that you should see Paranormal Activity. My wife refuses to see it, or trailers for it, or on-screen reviews of it, or anything--and I support her refusal. It would freak her out. |
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| whiskeypriest |
| Posted: Tue Oct 20, 2009 7:46 am |
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Joined: 20 May 2004
Posts: 6916
Location: "It's a Dry Heat."
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billyweeds wrote: Back to A Serious Man. In addition to Michael Stuhlbarg, whose performance in the Job-like leading role roots, carries, and lands the movie, there are many more performances which are among the best in their various categories for 2009. Richard Kind, as Stuhlbarg's loser brother, and Fred Malemed, as Stuhlbarg's wife's boyfriend, make unforgettable characters out of quite small though wonderfully well written roles. Sari Lennick as the wife finds layers upon layers in what might have been a cruel, misogynist cliche. And Amy Landecker, as the next-door-neighbor who sunbathes nude and smokes marijuana (the film is set in 1968), is hysterically funny and sexy as well, with one of the best deadpans since Buster Keaton.
This movie will haunt me for days--at least.
One critic points out that the Coens are on a roll, with three excellent features in a row--No Country for Old Men, Burn After Reading, and now (IMO) the capper, A Serious Man. |
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