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| gromit |
 Posted: Tue Jul 10, 2012 7:27 pm |
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Joined: 31 Aug 2004
Posts: 9016
Location: Shanghai
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Not sure if I'm the first here to have seen Bela Tarr's The Turin Horse. It has the force and power of a Bergman film, something like The Virgin Spring, but with less action and extra bleakness. Basically a father, with one crippled arm, and his adult daughter go through their routine of survival in an isolated stone farmhouse. It's sort of a de-creation story, as seven days unfold and less and less exists. The apocalypse as a wimper rather than a bang.
The b&w cinematography looks great. I liked the sounds and the music. For a film in which very little happens, it fully creates a mood, and in a subtle sneaky way really everything happens.
The title comes from an anecdote about Friedrich Nietzsche, who saw a man, in Turin, beating his horse in the street and Nietzsche stopped the abuse by falling upon the horse's neck and sobbing. Thereafter he became feeble-minded for the next decade until he died. During one scene where the camera slowly meditates upon the horse in the film, I tried to work out how the Nietzsche tale, narrated at the start of the film, fit the film. One possibility is that humanity is the dumb brute (the horse), God or Nature or whatever forces pummels us senseless, and we take the abuse, while the director (Tarr) weeps for our lamentable state. Not sure, but the film is pretty bleak, though not without a minimalist beauty. Tarr has said this will be his last film, as though such despair is his final word. Hopefully he's not going off into a Nietzschean syphilitic torpor.
I liked the film, but I also have no trouble with slow cinema, long takes, or watching routine behavior get completed in real time. I'd rec watching the film with an electric fan going, as the incessantly howling wind in the film is almost another character. It wasn't the same with the a/c on.
(really).
For anyone unfamiliar with Tarr, I think his Werkmeister Harmonies is a real masterpiece. Satantango is 7.5 hours long and in spirit is rather similar to Turin Horse, but Satantango takes place on the scale of an entire small village. The Man From London is a noirish tale, but didn't fully come together for me, and the dubbing of the very int'l cast is fairly distracting. It is probably his most accessible film. His early films are supposed to be social realist dramas in the Cassavetes mold. I have the first three and should dog them out and watch them. |
Last edited by gromit on Sat Sep 15, 2012 1:18 pm; edited 1 time in total
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| bartist |
| Posted: Wed Jul 11, 2012 5:50 pm |
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Joined: 27 Apr 2010
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Location: Black Hills
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| Finally saw Moonrise Kingdom, which restored my fondness for Wes Anderson. The film, beautifully photographed and edited, returns to the strengths in Rushmore, e.g. central characters who don't settle for mere alienation, but somehow rise to brilliant eccentricity and self-reliance. If you like the odd little fantasy niches, like Joseph Cornell boxes, in which Anderson places his people, then MK is great fun. |
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| Joe Vitus |
| Posted: Wed Jul 11, 2012 7:06 pm |
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Joined: 20 May 2004
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Location: Houston
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| Nice analogy. |
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| Befade |
| Posted: Wed Jul 11, 2012 11:16 pm |
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Joined: 20 May 2004
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Maybe the street scenes in Marigold Hotel were loud. I understand Ghulam calling it shallow.........but for me it was fun to see so many actors I like and the Indian setting,. It's a movie for people who never go to movies. They love it.
I was really disappointed in To Rome with Love. Full of cliches......(singing opera in the shower......reality shows that make uninteresting people famous......men unable to resist the impulse to cheat.) Alec Baldwin was wasted. Penelope Cruz was at her most luscious. Midnight in Paris was much more clever, funny, and focused......Owen Wilson had the right stuff for that. Rome was a travelogue and honestly, I don't enjoy seeing the Woodster on screen anymore. |
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| Syd |
| Posted: Thu Jul 12, 2012 12:38 am |
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Joined: 21 May 2004
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| From what I read, Allen was trying to juggle multiple plotlines without any of them amounting to much. I guess after tackling London, Barcelona and Paris, he found himself obligated to tackle Rome without much to say. Maybe he should have tackled Venice instead. Or Moscow. |
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| gromit |
| Posted: Thu Jul 12, 2012 1:22 am |
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Joined: 31 Aug 2004
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Location: Shanghai
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I think the big problem is that Woody commits to writing and directing a film per year, but he really doesn't want to put more than a couple months into each task. He has said a number of times that he has other things he is committed to -- jazz playing, family, travel, etc -- and filmmaking is just one thing he does.
So there's a noticeable hurriedness and sloppiness in his films. Minor characters and plotlines are often sketchy and/or cliche. He rarely does second takes, so a game I've played for decades is spot the scenes which needed Take 2. I think it's unfortunate, because he could do a much better job if he was more invested in his film projects and made half as many films. I'd much prefer a good well-thought out and executed Woody Allen film every other year, rather than a slight and slapdash Woody film every year.
It's hard to think of a Woody Allen film in the past decade or more which I'd like to revisit and watch a second time. I might even skip Rome ... Love after fairly faithfully catching the last 6 or 8 or 10 films he's churned out.
Woody should take on a writing partner and co-director to help do the extra work he's no longer interested in . |
Last edited by gromit on Sat Sep 15, 2012 1:20 pm; edited 1 time in total
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| Syd |
| Posted: Thu Jul 12, 2012 2:47 am |
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gromit wrote:
It's hard to think of a Woody Allen film in the past decade or more which I'd like to revisit and watch a second time. I might even skip Rome ... Love after fairly faithfully catching the last 6 or 8 or 10 films he's churned out.
Woody should take on a writing partner and co-director to help do the extra work he's no longer interested in .
Match Point and Midnight in Paris are worth rewatching. We'll never get to see his New Orleans film, which is one of those great might-have-beens. I'm not sure how serious Allen was about doing that film anyway. If Woody Allen wants a best Film and Director nomination, all he has to do is direct a film biography of Louis Armstrong. |
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Rocky Laocoon foretold of Troy's doom, only to find snaky water. They pulled him in and Rocky can't swim. Now Rocky wishes he were an otter! |
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| gromit |
| Posted: Thu Jul 12, 2012 4:03 am |
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Actually I re-watched Midnight in Paris and its flaws and slapdash nature were more apparent. The wife and her parents are really poorly handled.
I think that might work great if Woody plays Satchmo.
Or Chris Rock. One or the other. |
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| billyweeds |
| Posted: Thu Jul 12, 2012 6:48 am |
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Agree that Woody Allen stretches himself too thin. Midnight in Paris, Match Play, Vicky Cristina Barcelona and particularly You Will Meet a Tall Dark Stranger were good-to-very-good movies he's made in the last decade or so, but otherwise he's been spinning his wheels or (hello, Anything Else, Whatever Works) far worse. Haven't seen To Rome with Love and don't intend to.
Skipped Savages, btw. |
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| bartist |
| Posted: Thu Jul 12, 2012 8:09 am |
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Thanks for the nod to my analogy, Joe - the opening credits, in Moonrise K, in particular made me think of Joseph Cornell - all the little intro shots into each room of the house. Loved the retro camera work.
Had no plans to see the current Woody or Ollie. Sounds like Befade took a bullet for the team. The only "retirement age" director who I absolutely won't miss is Polanski. You can debate the flaws all day, but what he does is always interesting and, IMO, shows the work of a serious craftsman who knows exactly what he wants. |
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He was wise beyond his years, but only by a few days. |
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| Joe Vitus |
| Posted: Thu Jul 12, 2012 10:32 am |
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You're welcome.
I laughed throughout Midnight in Paris and still left the theater disappointed. The parents and the girlfriend were out of some sitcom. The gosh-but-aren't-we-nice phantoms from the past were insipid. In an earlier era, the girlfriend would have been willing to walk through the rain with him, and they both would have gotten pneumonia.
I did like the surrealists, though. |
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| gromit |
| Posted: Thu Jul 12, 2012 10:39 am |
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Joe Vitus wrote:
I did like the surrealists, though.
I liked how Man Ray isn't surprised at all at Owen Wilson's situation and his time travel doings just fit right into his warped world view.
A lot of folks said they liked Dali, but since basically he just repeats that he's Dali about 10 times, I felt like Woody kind of came up blank with that one.
The notion that Rome has four story lines that don't relate sounds like a typical Woody shortcut. |
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Killing your enemies, if it's done badly, increases their number. |
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| Joe Vitus |
| Posted: Thu Jul 12, 2012 11:40 am |
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| I hadn't remembered it was Man Ray who did this, but, yes, that was exactly the event in the movie I was referring to. |
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You've got a great brain. You should keep it in your head.
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| Befade |
| Posted: Thu Jul 12, 2012 1:25 pm |
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Quote: Sounds like Befade took a bullet for the team. The only "retirement age" director who I absolutely won't miss is Polanski.
I was wondering if that was the case. I had intended to see Headhunters but it had left the theatre. I have read the book by Jo Nesbo, a Norwegian, and two others. He can include sadistic violence but he is.......of all the Scandinavian writers......more clever, more intelligent, interesting, and a champion of plotting. Headhunters involves art theft and .......extreme headhunting.
Polanski's last two films were very satisfying. Altzeimer's has taken the names. |
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| carrobin |
| Posted: Thu Jul 12, 2012 1:30 pm |
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Joined: 21 May 2004
Posts: 7795
Location: NYC
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| I did like "The Ghost Writer" a lot. Though I kind of wish they'd kept the British title, "The Ghost." I guess they figured people would go in expecting Patrick Swayze. |
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