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| bartist |
 Posted: Thu May 19, 2011 8:52 am |
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Joined: 27 Apr 2010
Posts: 6967
Location: Black Hills
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Finally saw Somewhere, Sofia Coppola's nearly plotless slice-o-life about a famous actor and the emptiness and lack of real grounding that can go with celebrity. As films go, it's more a poem than a story, and there are scenes that are quiet and contemplative, getting you deep into the mood without saying much. People want things from the actor, there are questions that he is expected to answer, and there is more than just a pinch of 8.5 here.
It's quite funny in places, as in one peculiar Benicio Del Toro cameo, where they exchange a few words in an elevator. The actor takes what comfort he can from a faux-family at the Chateau Marmont where he is staying -- a team of pole dancers, an old man with a guitar who sings to him in the Lobby, a vixen across the hall, etc.
The plot, what there is of it, centers around a visit from his daughter and his struggle to create some sense of home and family. Sad, funny, touching -- I was surprised at how much I was drawn in by a type of film that often makes me squirm and check my watch. |
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He was wise beyond his years, but only by a few days. |
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| knox |
| Posted: Thu May 19, 2011 9:23 am |
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Joined: 18 Mar 2010
Posts: 1246
Location: St. Louis
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| I liked the scene where he gets his face molded, for a film, and the camera just sits on him for a while, looking grotesque and alone with the plaster all over his head. Sofia has a way with just holding a shot and letting you absorb the meaning. |
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| whiskeypriest |
| Posted: Thu May 19, 2011 9:42 am |
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Joined: 20 May 2004
Posts: 6916
Location: "It's a Dry Heat."
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| Finally saw Facebook: The Movie, which I enjoyed very much, without finding it brilliant or transformative, or generation defining, or any of the terms I've seen thrown around to describe it, including great except in a screenplay way. |
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I ask you, Velvel, as a rational man, which of us is possessed? |
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| whiskeypriest |
| Posted: Thu May 19, 2011 11:18 am |
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Joined: 20 May 2004
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Location: "It's a Dry Heat."
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| It was nice to see John Getz as Mark Zuckerburg's lawyer, by the way. |
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I ask you, Velvel, as a rational man, which of us is possessed? |
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| chillywilly |
| Posted: Tue May 24, 2011 6:56 pm |
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Joined: 20 May 2004
Posts: 8251
Location: Salt Lake City
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The Social Network for me was filled with many assumptions and given how most tech people (like myself) knew some of dirty details of the story, I was surprised how much I enjoyed watching how things played out on the screen. Very much like my first viewing of Apollo 13. I knew the story from the news reports and as a kid on TV, but was on the edge of my seat watching it all happen in filmmaking style.
While the edge of my seat isn't a descriptive way of how I was during my viewing of TSN, the combination of a good script, a well-fit soundtracks and characters like Jesse Eisenberg and Justin Timberlake helped re-create some tech news story about how a social networking platform was created. |
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Chilly
"If you should die before me / Ask if you could bring a friend" |
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| gromit |
| Posted: Fri May 27, 2011 8:41 am |
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Joined: 31 Aug 2004
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Location: Shanghai
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I was ona good roll with indie films about childhood.
I know I mentioned It's Not Me I Swear and Swedish Love Story.
Then I hit a bit of a rut with creaky Hollywood vehicles.
Night of the Generals has some good moments, but overall plods along. A number of scenes look like freshly painted sets. The O'Toole character never seems real, etc. And it was overlong.
Much of the same problems bedevil To Each His Own, with the added trap of some stylized melodrama, and unconvincing time leaps. The old age makeup in the last section is poorly done and looks silly.
It has more than hint of the pre-code films boiling underneath, with a sweet small town girl bonking a traveling air show pilot during WWI, having a child out of wedlock which she hides. To avoid opprobrium, she arranges for the baby to be left on the doorstep of a poor neighbor with loads of kids, so that she can step in and "adopt" her own child. But something goes wrong in a just-at-that-moment plot twist the film is fond of.
Olivia de Havilland won Best Actress for this.
I probably should look up what the competition was.
The whole happy ending stuff seem so fraudulent, as one character becomes a total guardian angel making everything right. Surprised they didn't show him earning his wings and ascending to heaven.
Anyway, too long and suddenly dramatic for my taste. |
Last edited by gromit on Mon Sep 01, 2014 5:56 am; edited 1 time in total
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Killing your enemies, if it's done badly, increases their number. |
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| bartist |
| Posted: Fri May 27, 2011 8:59 am |
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Joined: 27 Apr 2010
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Location: Black Hills
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The best way to get sudden drama is a rain of toads. You rarely expect that.
When I was 14, I wanted to bonk O. DeH, as she appeared in the Robin Hood with Errol Flynn.
Only barnstormer-based film I've seen is the one with Redford, "Where's Waldo Pepper" or whatever it's called. |
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He was wise beyond his years, but only by a few days. |
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| gromit |
| Posted: Fri May 27, 2011 9:02 am |
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Joined: 31 Aug 2004
Posts: 9016
Location: Shanghai
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I did bounce back with two early Ken Loach films , nicely tucked on to one disc. I usually think Loach is a somewhat inept filmmaker, but I got involved in these two films. I'd say that Poor Cow 1967 is basically social realism informed by the French New Wave. A good combination. It reminded me a good deal of Wanda 1970 -- an overlooked indie gem of the same era -- with a lower-class small-town blonde going from man to man, many of whom are thieves.
Family Life (1971) was a little more disturbing with a somewhat flighty young adult girl harshly experiencing the generation gap, as she gets committed to a mental hospital by her stiff lower-middle class parents, and subjected to both experimental group therapy and more traditional treatment such as the barbarism of electroshock. A very good central performance. A good study of the youth revolution gone wrong for one family. At times it's easy to forget that it is a fiction film. It reminded me of a melding of Allan King documentaries -- like Come On Children, A Married Couple and Warrendale all rolled into one.
If you can find the Axiom disc with both films paired together, I'd rec checking them out. |
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Killing your enemies, if it's done badly, increases their number. |
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| Syd |
| Posted: Fri May 27, 2011 11:09 am |
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Joined: 21 May 2004
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Location: Norman, Oklahoma
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gromit wrote: ...
Much of the same problems bedevil To Each His Own, with the added trap of some stylized melodrama, and unconvincing time leaps. The old age makeup in the last section is poorly done and looks silly.
...
Olivia de Havilland won Best Actress for this.
I haven't seen that one, but she richly deserved her other one, for The Heiress. |
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| billyweeds |
| Posted: Sat May 28, 2011 5:47 am |
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Joined: 20 May 2004
Posts: 20618
Location: New York City
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| Saw a riveting little film called A Better Place streaming from Netflix. It's a sad and intermittently graphically violent story about teen alienation produced by Kevin Smith but decidedly not a comedy, and IMO better than any of Smith's own films by a wide margin. It's horrifying but very well done, and impossible to stop watching once you've started. Well worth your time. |
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| Joe Vitus |
| Posted: Sat May 28, 2011 9:47 am |
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Joined: 20 May 2004
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Location: Houston
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| Now see this is the weirdest thing, and it has happened to me before. But I just went over to Netflix, and A Better Place is not available streaming for me. Why? At any rate, your post intrigues me, and the movie goes into my queue. |
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You've got a great brain. You should keep it in your head.
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| billyweeds |
| Posted: Sat May 28, 2011 10:42 am |
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Joined: 20 May 2004
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Location: New York City
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Joe Vitus wrote: Now see this is the weirdest thing, and it has happened to me before. But I just went over to Netflix, and A Better Place is not available streaming for me. Why? At any rate, your post intrigues me, and the movie goes into my queue.
This is weird too, but A Better Place is not listed as streaming for me either, yet I saw it streamed just yesterday. Maybe, since I had previously put it into my Netflix streaming queue it stayed there even after they had removed it from the streaming list. Does this make any sense? I will call Netflix and figure this out.
P.S. Called Netfllx. It was removed from streaming last night--weird--but only temporarily, and will be back streaming in the very near future. |
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| knox |
| Posted: Sat May 28, 2011 10:53 am |
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Joined: 18 Mar 2010
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Location: St. Louis
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Agree on "Somewhere," though the ending was too symbolic to work for me. He's leaving that life behind? He's going to let the buzzards eat him in the desert? He needs to stretch his legs and have a whiz?
A Better Life -- wasn't sure I wanted to try this.... teen angsters are pretty hit and miss for me. But, as happens, some of whatever made it compelling to you came across, so now I'm curious. |
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| Joe Vitus |
| Posted: Sat May 28, 2011 11:07 am |
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Joined: 20 May 2004
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Location: Houston
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| Thanks, Billy. Will definitely check it out. |
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You've got a great brain. You should keep it in your head.
-Topher |
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| billyweeds |
| Posted: Sat May 28, 2011 11:41 am |
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Joined: 20 May 2004
Posts: 20618
Location: New York City
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knox wrote: Agree on "Somewhere," though the ending was too symbolic to work for me. He's leaving that life behind? He's going to let the buzzards eat him in the desert? He needs to stretch his legs and have a whiz?
A Better Life -- wasn't sure I wanted to try this.... teen angsters are pretty hit and miss for me. But, as happens, some of whatever made it compelling to you came across, so now I'm curious.
It's called A Better Place, not Life. And it's actually more about teens who are conflicted and in some cases sociopathic rather than genuinely angst-ridden. It's not your usual teen-alienation flick. |
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