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Empire's "The 100 Best Films Of World Cinema" almost 3 years ago

Why isn’t Godzilla Final Wars on that list? Or Gamera III: The Revenge of Iris! An outrage!

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Your Obscure Autuer almost 3 years ago

My favorite obscure auteur: Gordon Douglas

He worked in all genres and turned out films of widely varying quality over a career that lasted some 40-odd years.

But his best work consists of top-drawer Hollywood genre filmmaking:

THEM! (1954) – arguably the best giant insect movie
ROBIN AND THE SEVEN HOODS (1964) – arguably the best “Rat Pack” movie
THE IRON MISTRESS (1952) – arguably the best Jim Bowie movie (It takes place pre-Alamo.)
YOUNG AT HEART (1954) – great teaming of Sinatra and Day and a quintessential Sinatra movie
THE DETECTIVE (1968) – one of Sinatra’s best performances and a gritty New York cop pic that got too quickly overshadowed by BULLITT, COOGAN’S BLUFF and MADIGAN the same year. But this one holds up very well.
BETWEEN MIDNIGHT AND DAWN (1950) – solid police drama with noir elements and some great location shooting in L.A.
THE DOOLINS OF OKLAHOMA (1949) – good western that’s arguably the best film about outlaw Bill Doolin.

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Singers Acting and How They Fare almost 3 years ago

What, no Elvis???? Check out Don Siegel’s “Flaming Star” for a great Elvis performance. Not to mention Michael Curtiz’s “King Creole.” And, okay, “Roustabout” might be labeled a musical, but it’s more of a drama and Elvis’s scenes with Barbara Stanwyck are great. I think he qualifies.

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Singers Acting and How They Fare almost 3 years ago

Anita Mui and Leslie Cheung were both pop singers in Hong Kong and they were superb actors as well, esp. in this film, ROUGE (1987).

http://community.travelchinaguide.com/photo/7092/70920044421788.jpg

[What do you have to do to get the picture to show on this site?]

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Favorite/best director almost 3 years ago

Norman Taurog, whose directing career went from silent comedies starring Larry Semon in 1920 to the Elvis musical, Live a Little, Love a Little in 1968. 48 years. Not a bad run, eh?

Some of his notable films in that time span: The Adventures of Tom Sawyer (1938), Mad About Music, Boys Town, Broadway Melody of 1940, Young Tom Edison, Presenting Lily Mars, Little Nellie Kelly, Girl Crazy, Jumping Jacks, The Stooge, The Caddy, Living It Up, Onionhead, Don’t Give Up the Ship, G.I. Blues, Blue Hawaii, Sergeant Deadhead, Tickle Me, Spinout, and Speedway (1968).

What a lineup of people he worked with: Deanna Durbin, Mickey Rooney, Judy Garland, Fred Astaire, Martin & Lewis, Jerry Lewis (solo), Andy Griffith, the Beach Party crew, and Elvis Presley in some of his better musical features. Not to mention Juliet Prowse, Angela Lansbury, Deborah Walley, Shelley Fabares, Diane McBain, and Nancy Sinatra. I believe he’s the only director to have directed both Durbin and Garland. That alone should have cemented his place in the history of the American movie musical.

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Movies seem different at Film Festivals.... than alone at home. almost 3 years ago

If it’s a bad film, it’s even more excruciating for me in a setting like that. Because I usually can’t just walk out. And because everyone else seems to be liking this piece of manure. It’s torture.

Now, there are settings where the audience can help determine your reaction. If I had seen GODZILLA FINAL WARS at home I might have shaken my head at how ludicrous it was. But seeing it with a packed house of ravenous Godzilla fans (like me) who cheered and applauded every monster cameo was truly exhilarating. I loved it.

There’s a local revival house where everyone laughs at…EVERYTHING! Sometimes that ruins a film. Sometimes it helps. THE BRAIN FROM PLANET AROUS played better because people laughed at certain things that were, in fact, funny. And I might not have reacted that way at home. For instance, there’s a bit where John Agar detects strange radio signals coming from Mystery Mountain and says to his assistant, Robert Fuller, “We’ve got to go check out Mystery Mountain.” To which Fuller replies anxiously, “But not before we eat LUNCH!” And the crowd roared. And it WAS intentionally funny. But I might have only chuckled at home.

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what is the widest aspect ratio used? almost 3 years ago

Johnny, which film in your collection is the one with a 2.71:1 ratio?

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Are Monica Vitti and Anna Karina not that widely known? almost 3 years ago

I’m a baby boomer and both Karina and Vitti came to prominence during my adolescence, so I saw a lot of their films in film school. Film buffs in my age group know them well. But my parents, who weren’t film buffs, wouldn’t have heard of them. And it’s doubtful my daughter (in her mid-20s) has.

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Movies About Voluntary Isolation From Society? almost 3 years ago

That one about the guy and the wolves. Never Cry Wolf, I think it was, with Charlie Martin Smith.

And Gorillas in the Mist, with Sigourney Weaver as Dian Fossey.

Both based on true stories.

How about something like Robinson Crusoe on Mars?

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Top 10 TV Shows of all time almost 3 years ago

The Abbott and Costello Show
The Jack Benny Show
The Untouchables
The Twilight Zone
The Man from U.N.C.L.E.
Star Trek (original)
The Odd Couple
Mork and Mindy
Mighty Morphin Power Rangers
Pokemon

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What is the first Foreign Language film you remember seeing? almost 3 years ago

The Longest Day (1962) was the first film I saw that had subtitles. (All the French and German scenes were in those languages, with subs. But when it premiered on network TV sometime in the early ’70s, all the foreign language scenes had been dubbed into English.)

The first actual fully foreign language film I saw was Bresson’s Diary of a Country Priest, which a church social worker took us poor culturally-deprived kids to see at her school, Union Theological Seminary. We were bored silly. I remember falling asleep. Not the right choice for rambunctious ghetto 7th-graders. One of the group heaped verbal abuse on the social worker afterwards and made her cry. Poor kid.

The first foreign-language film I went to on my own was in high school: The Seven Samurai.

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If you could pick one director to remake it. almost 3 years ago

Remake Seven Samurai? John Woo

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Favorite use of a song in a film. almost 3 years ago

Olivia Newton-John’s version of “Country Roads” (John Denver) in Yoshifumi Kondo’s animated masterpiece, Whisper of the Heart (1995), produced by Hayao Miyazaki.

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Fully developed disabled characters almost 3 years ago

Old Man Potter in It’s a Wonderful Life.

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Henry Jaglom not given enough attention on this site almost 3 years ago

Henry Jaglom has already gotten MORE than enough attention on this site.

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Favorite/best director almost 3 years ago

Yeah, pretty much everything Kubrick did was based on a book…except Fear and Desire, his little-seen first feature; Killer’s Kiss, his more widely-seen second feature; and…2001: A Space Odyssey, in which the book by Arthur C. Clarke was a result of the work they did together on the script, not the basis for the script. (Although, the script includes ideas from two of Clarke’s works, “The Sentinels” and “Childhood’s End,” or so I recall. Or maybe just “The Sentinels.” I read “Childhood’s End” and I don’t remember anything in it that connected to 2001.)

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Barbra Streisand has one fan while Kevin Smith has nearly 400 WTF almost 3 years ago

Barbra Streisand hasn’t been relevant to film buffs in ages. I think the last thing she was involved in that I liked was Peter Bogdanovich’s What’s Up Doc? (1972)—38 years ago. I doubt that anyone in my daughter’s generation (20-somethings) has seen much, if any, of her work. Streisand is more relevant in the world of political fund-raisers and Clinton supporters. And possibly relevant to music fans. Has she done any concerts lately? Recorded any albums? This question tends to belong more on a music forum than a movie forum. She’s a singer/musical theater performer who lucked into a Hollywood career thanks to Funny Girl and a fluke of an Oscar win for it.

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Barbra Streisand has one fan while Kevin Smith has nearly 400 WTF almost 3 years ago

Forgot about that one. Didn’t see it. Maybe I’M the one that’s irrelevant.

(Wouldn’t be the first time I’ve felt that way.)

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GREAT MOVIES WHERE THE ENDING (ALMOST) RUINS EVERYTHING almost 3 years ago

MILLION DOLLAR BABY

SHAWSHANK REDEMPTION

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I Don't Believe in Canon or Autuers... almost 3 years ago

I believe every movie should have some kung fu in it.

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GREAT MOVIES WHERE THE ENDING (ALMOST) RUINS EVERYTHING almost 3 years ago

No, it’s not that at all, I found his escape completely implausible. I just didn’t buy it for a second that he could have pulled it off. Given his position in the warden’s office, they would have searched his cell regularly with great scrutiny and found…what they would have found. The film started out as a relatively realistic prison drama about a man who makes the best of a bad situation by beefing up the prison library, lobbying for increased funding, making it a real service for the other inmates, etc., but then it turned into a fantasy with that big reveal at the two-hour mark. It probably played better on paper as a short story with a fable-like quality. But as a two-and-a-half-hour film, they needed to make it more believable. Plus, it’s highly doubtful the newspaper would have printed the story. The publisher would be buddies with the members of the parole board and they would have quietly corrected the situation, putting out a story that the warden resigned to pursue other interests or something. Like I said, a fantasy.

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Did you know there are people who don't like Charlie Chaplin? almost 3 years ago

Would film be the art form/entertainment medium it became without Chaplin? Would auteur filmmakers have attained the power they did without him? Would Orson Welles have emerged without the example of Chaplin before him? I don’t know, but we owe him a lot, whether we find his comedy funny or not.

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Top 10 Mongolian Films almost 3 years ago

THE GOLDEN HORDE (1951) with Marvin Miller as Genghis Khan
DESTINATION GOBI (1953) with Richard Widmark and Murvyn Vye
THE CONQUEROR (1956) with John Wayne as Genghis Khan
KING OF THE MONGOLS (1960) with Jun Tazaki
THE MONGOLS (1961) with Jack Palance and Anita Ekberg
MARCO POLO (1962) with Rory Calhoun
HERCULES AGAINST THE MONGOLS (1963) with Mark Forest as Maciste
GENGHIS KHAN (1965) with Omar Sharif as Genghis Khan
MARCO THE MAGNIFICENT (1965) with Horst Buchholz as Marco Polo, Anthony Quinn as Kublai Khan
THE BRAVE ARCHER (1977) with Fu Sheng as a Chinese youth raised by Genghis Khan

There, the 10 best “Mongolian” films I’ve seen.

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I'm looking for musicals almost 3 years ago

MOHABBATEIN (2000) is a good place to start with Bollywood movies. Lots of elaborate musical numbers featuring attractive young men and women and intricate group choreography. It reminded me of all kinds of Hollywood movies (GREASE, WEST SIDE STORY, BYE BYE BIRDIE, etc.).

Elvis Presley: VIVA LAS VEGAS is the best musical he did and one of the few in which he has a female star who’s also a musical performer and treated as a true musical co-star…Ann-Margret.

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Movies about Blacklisting, Muzzling, and Censorship almost 3 years ago

GOODBYE MY FANCY (1951) deals with the subject of censorship on campus in terms of a controversial speaker being invited and pressure put on the students to “disinvite” him. Surprisingly outspoken material couched in a Joan Crawford melodrama.

STORM CENTER (1955), starring Bette Davis, deals with library censorship.

CAREER (1959) with Dean Martin and Shirley MacLaine, makes a reference to blacklisting.

FEAR ON TRIAL (1975 TV movie) deals with TV/radio personality John Henry Faulk who was blacklisted based on false accusations in the 1950s and took his blacklisters to trial and won the case. William Devane plays Faulk.

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Favorite Fuller Film almost 3 years ago

It’s been a long time since I’ve watched any Fuller films. I believe I’ve seen them all except for SHARK, which he disavowed, and the two he made in France after WHITE DOG.

I liked most if not all of them. If I had to pick the ones I liked the best, they’d be THE STEEL HELMET and SHOCK CORRIDOR, with MERRILL’S MARAUDERS, CHINA GATE, FORTY GUNS and RUN OF THE ARROW right behind. Maybe when I get around to seeing the restored BIG RED ONE (I have it on DVD), I might add that to the list.

But I really need to see them again.

And THE STEEL HELMET was the first. It was in the pre-VCR era and I had to set my alarm clock and wake up at 4:00 in the morning to watch it on “The Late Show” on Channel 2 (the local CBS affiliate). It was well worth it. After that, I made a point of catching all his films when I could. Luckily, there were plenty of Sam Fuller retrospectives in New York around that time (early ’70s), so I was able to catch most of them on the big screen.

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About Film Noir almost 3 years ago

The French came up with the term “film noir” sometime in the 1950s to describe the films in the ‘40s that we’re all talking about. I once did a paper on this subject when I was a graduate student at NYU and I read dozens of old reviews and articles about these films. There were active objections to these films (often from the left, e.g. the leftist NYC daily, PM) and a clear sense that critics and commentators knew that something different was happening. They just didn’t have the term “film noir” to describe the phenomenon. Bosley Crowther of the New York Times called them “homicidal melodramas” in his review of THE STRANGE LOVE OF MARTHA IVERS. Edward Dmytryk said that when he did CROSSFIRE, he and his crew were trying to make something more “realistic.” (Same with the makers of THE KILLERS, 1946.) John Houseman (producer of THE BLUE DAHLIA) railed against the new trend of “tough” films. James Agee wrote about these reactions in his reviews of films like THE BIG SLEEP, THE DARK CORNER, THE BLUE DAHLIA, THE POSTMAN ALWAYS RINGS TWICE and other film noir. His reviews are all collected in a book called “Agee on Film,” a must-read for anyone interested in this subject. (Or in great film criticism.)

So people were aware of it as it was happening. They just didn’t know enough to call it “film noir.”

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3 most visually pleasing films you've ever seen almost 3 years ago

John Ford’s The Searchers
Vincente Minnelli’s Lust for Life
Sam Peckinpah’s The Wild Bunch

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