Well, there is a certain amount of the Criterion DVDs that are codefree, but most are not. No Problem, my player was easy to be modidied. But with blu-ray – the code thing, especially criterion, is the only reason I do restrain from changing to the new format. Seems I will stick to DVD for quite some time. I am ok with that, by the way. Saves a lot of money.
As Last Year in Marienbad, which I saw for the first time recently, it belongs to a certain canon of artsy, so-called “not easy to access” films. Personally I loved Antonioni (and especially L’Eclisse) right from the start while my relationship with Marienbad is rather difficult. Both have a reputation of being difficult but I always find Antonioni easier to just give in to the beauty. He does not force you to think all the time, I guess.
For me Citizen Kane is such a great classic because you can study a lot of film techniques watching it – as regards to the storytelling, editing, deep focus or simply the sophisticated technical achievements (which have been listed in this thread already). That does not make it the best film ever, of course. It is still fun to make such lists, though.
For me Citizen Kane is such a great classic because you can study a lot of film techniques watching it – as regards to the storytelling, editing, deep focus or simply the sophisticated technical achievements (which have been listed in this thread already). That does not make it the best film ever, of course. It is still fun to make such lists, though.
I was about to answer: Well, mainstream has completely devoted itself to the ever same ingredients, to the ever same formula – be it in action, be it in romcom. But then I thought: Wait, didn’t they rely on certain fixed structures in the old days, too? Maybe the difference is: Then they worked freely with it, using it to their advantage and proving their capabilities by sticking to the structure, but at the same time filling it with new ideas?
But then: Weren’t there a lot of bad mainstream movies in the old days, too?
Tarantino, Four Rooms (1995). This is really unbelievable bad, and Tarantinos part still is the best of the four episodes in this collaborative work. The whole thing is a pain to watch. Four Rooms may be the lousiest film of all the other participating directors, too (Robert Rodriguez, Alexandre Rockwell, Allison Anders).
I recently bought a blu-ray player and am quite happy with it – the print of Chungking Express just looks marvellous and is fun to watch – so I would not say blu-ray only appeals to the fans of Dark Knight, 300 and other action flicks. But if I look back into the days before all this advanced technology I find myself not even caring about such stuff. I watched bad VHS-copies and even worse prints in cheap cinemas. Even today a film club here in town shows classic movies in rather bad condition, not stopping me and a lot of other film buffs to go seeing them. It still is the movie that counts, isn’t it? Or maybe getting used to dvd and blu-ray will increase our sensitivity and make us care more and more about things whose correct technical denotation I still cannot force myself to remember?
Or are we just about to get to cinematic heaven, and at the same time realising that until now we have been in hell?
film grain and blu-ray are not necessarily in opposition. With old films, the blu-ray often preserves that cellulloid-feeling, for example in my blu-ray of Raging Bull, and also in Chungking Express there is lots of grain. With new films it is a different story. M. Manns Hi-Def Public Enemies, judging from the trailer, indeed does not look like film anymore.
Richard, I very much agree, especially to your last sentence:
“The day we say that watching a film in anything less than 1080p is “not really watching the film”, is the day that we have pretty much given in to visual snobbery.”
Also, I do not want to invest a considerable amount of time in learning technical stuff regarding the perfect home theater experience or whatever. I want to watch films. Period.
@Jacob
No need to be depressed ;-)
Of course I know some stuff and find it interesting to a certain degree. But reading blu-ray and dvd-reviews that only refer to the tech specs makes me yawn. I once surfed through Hi-Fi forums when I was looking for a LCD TV and Blu Ray player and such, and boy did I understand little.
That was my point to start this whole thread: Having Chungking Express and Ran in a never before seen quality is nice, but for me not the most important thing about films. And I hope it will remain being like this. With all the new developments it might change – you know, paying eight euros für a night in a cinema with bad projection while knowing that I could watch this at home in better quality …
Well, I just saw 2001, Lawrence of Arabia, Hello Dolly, Mutiny on the Bounty and West Side Story in 70mm at the Berlinale Retrospective this year – and it totally blew me away. So yes, image quality matters to me. And combined with the cinema experience it is priceless (of course you only get superiour quality on film festivals). And it is very valuable, what the dvd culture (and critereion et al) do for film – making it available in the best possible transfer. So, really, I start getting hooked on image quality, and sense a certain change of heart with myself. That’s why I started this thread. It would be sad, if the new technology was not used to give the films the treatment they deserve, wouldn’t it? I like properly edited books and well restored paintings, too.
I don’t say these are overrated, I just say they did not do it for me, for whatever reason:
Theodoros Angelopoulos: Ulysses’ Gaze (I’d rather read Homer backwards in greek with my head in a vice!)
Blues Brothers (probably because I saw it too late in life)
Lord of the Rings (good for one viewing, but that’s it)
Christian Petzold’s Gespenster (trying too hard to be different; I like most of his other stuff, though)
Fellini’s Casanova just makes me nervous.
Also I would not say that Forrest Gump is considered a masterpiece. It was just a very successful movie, but also dumped by a lot of critics. So though I do not like it very much I would rather not put it on this list.
Roscoe, still I got laughed at by friends for being a cinerati, who knows so much movies, but has never seen Blues Brothers, a film which everybody in the world seems to know. : -)
another one: Bressons Lancelot du Lac. I found the exaggerated noises of the metal armour produced a rather comic effect. Felt like Monty Python without the jokes.
I also could not help being bored by Procès de Jeanne d’Arc and L’argent, but maybe I just have to see them again. Balthasar and Mouchette on the contrary I find very touching.
And Raging Bull is nothing less than fantastic: a quite deep exploration of really annoying characters and simply the most beautiful b/w photography I know of. (just bought the blu-ray and was blown away). And of course Cathy Moriarty!
Recently I ran into a retrospective of Tobacks work during a german festival. I had heard of “Fingers” but was quite unaware of his other work. While he surely has a rather unorthodox style without being the best director alive I still liked what i saw. Especially his lacking interest in plot, but rather going for situation (I remeber a dancing Nastassja Kinski in Exposed and a maybe 5 minute long wordfight on Times Square at the beginning of When will I be loved. Very few films of Toback are shown or available in Germany. I wonder if he has a strong following in the US. Any Toback fans here?
Rudy V, I guess I was lucky that I saw Exposed. It was part of said retrospective, and the man himself was there to talk about his films (something he apparantly very much enjoyed). I can also recommend the documentary about Toback that you mention, it draws a lively picture. About Tyson I was a bit unsure. It is an interesting interview with him, made stylish by using some sort of splitscreen stuff. Toback used a digicam here so he could film tons of footage, which resulted in some really good moments. But all in all it is just an interview.
I would guess that people who like Toback like Ferrara as well.
Stuff like Antoinoni or Wong Kar-Wei is surely not your parent’s cup of tea if they think that all foreign movies ar bad. Something more easily digestible (because of a real storyline) can be Rosselinis Rome, Open City (fight against Nazis, produced very shortly after WW2). 7 Samurai I’d say is far too long for beginners and from a culture too far from their own (they may always like The Magnificent Seven better). Anyway, foreign film does not neccessarily mean Arthouse, and especially not Arthouse from decades ago. The French do some decent Action Cinema (Les Rivières pourpres, L’Empire des Loups) and some comedy. There are breathtaking thrillers from Hongkong (Infernal Affairs I-III).
You also can check out Almodovars latest Volver, I’d say it is his most mainstream (but still Almodovar!). From Germany I’d recommend The Tin Drum and Life of Others (Oscar Winners!); Run, Lola Run; and maybe some Fassbinder. Go for Lola for starters.
I am not sure what the wall is for. Is it supposed to be a kind of a guestbook or is the user himself supposed to write on it? Or both? And why do that instead of sending a message to someone?
One more thing: The database of watchable films is growing, but there is no way to detect which films are new to watch in my country. I would like to have a column on the start page, or maybe a message to my account, everytime films are added, with the titles named. And only the ones I actually can watch. Otherwise I have to look through the whole database every other week or so.
sorry for going a little OT:
This thread reminds me of a film critic class at university, long time ago. Upon receiving the list of films to watch for the semester, one girl complained there were no female directors on that list, except for Rosa von Praunheim …
@RAWDEALBUFFY If I interpret Your words correctly than it is a more thorough storyline you miss, some objective or aim the characters should have. Well, maybe you are right, then french films are not for you ;-)
No, really: One can not honestly say that there is nothing happening, so Your Godot reference is far from, well, everything. I mean, there is even a car crash! :-) The men become friends, they fall in love, they quarrel over the same woman, they marry, they go to war (against each other!), one of them – and the woman – dies. And they are not the first generation after WWII. They fight in WW Number one. The novel on which the film is built is from the 50ies but describes an autobiographical story from the 10 and 20ies.
But Jules & Jim, which I saw many times but also a long time ago, for me never was a film where the plot itself was that important. It is about friendship and art. And about a lovingly impulsive woman. And about how this freely but deeply and unconventional attached people fail, because society pushes them somwhere else: the war makes them enemies, the morale would not allow a threesome etc.
(forgive my weak language, I am not a native speaker)
Still, this is on the level of what is this film about. Even more important is the question of: how is it done? How is the story told? And that’s where Truffaut comes in with his down-to-the-roots-storytelling, with his elaborate but at the same time very light camerawork. Every time I see J&J it just makes me feel good, like a glass of fresh lemon juice. And not like a modern day crowdpleaser, in which I can sense I am being manipulated all the time.
In the american sort of remake of J&J, called “Willie & Phil” from 1980, the two male characters get to know each other in New York after a cinema screening of J&J, on the boardwalk, talking about how special and life changing that film is. They then become friends and try to share the same woman, like in the original.
Bobby, I find that hard to believe, too. Plus Truffaut in general is much easier to relate to than to other french masters as Godard, Rivette or Rohmer.
Jules et Jim was made in the sixties but is set before and shortly after World War one. Truffaut used old film techniques/styles from this period of time to tell his story, maybe that is what upsets you, Steve. I found it charming.
Yes, agreed, J&J are the forerunners of the 68ies, or at least correspond with them.
Rawdealbuffy, I don’t think there is something you “did not get” with the film that may change your level appreciation. I reckon it is one of those you love at first sight or never.
Also, I would like to add that in contrast to Justin I do like the characters very much, especially because of their inaccuracies. I do not understand what is wrong with Catherine. But then, I do understand the longing of the two men to make her happy.
I think this topic exists because of a discussion we had about Jules et Jim (et Catherine) on another thread. It’s a great idea.
- Tony Soprano
- most of the crooks from The Wire, expecially Omar
- Poppy
- of course Antoine Doinel
- Ethan Edwards
- Darth Vader (um, well …)
- The Man in Murnaus’s Sunrise
Bujalski’s Beeswax and Bradley Rust’s The Exploding Girl are the only films I’ve seen that can be regarded as Mumblecore. Both are very good. The former mainly in its way to treat the characters and because it interestingly deals with language. The latter also because of its visual strength.
So, regarding the question on top of this thread, I’d say yes, worthy of criterion. Just like every good film is.
very much more often than a good use of slow motion (as the scarcely noticable one in Raging Bull, while the camera concentrates on Jakes first wife cooking steaks, the poetic ones In The Mood For Love or the scary ones from David Lynch) I encounter a very bad one. Thank god I tend to forget them, but I still have a rather hostile initial reaction towards slow motion. It can be very annoying because of its redundancy and cheap use of effect. Very often a slow motion seems to have nothing more to say than: hey, audience, watch closely now. Even if there is nothing to see.
What is the function of a slow motion anyway, astheticaly-wise or plotwise?
A man and a woman hold some stuff together, maybe dishes or something while cleaning a table, or one hands something over to somebody, and it falls down into pieces. They both kneel to clear up the mess, when by accident their hands meet, they look each other in the eye – and realise that they have been in love.
This kind of scene to illustrate awakening love without spoken words may have been good the first few times it was used, but that must be long ago.
Region about 3 years ago
Well, there is a certain amount of the Criterion DVDs that are codefree, but most are not. No Problem, my player was easy to be modidied. But with blu-ray – the code thing, especially criterion, is the only reason I do restrain from changing to the new format. Seems I will stick to DVD for quite some time. I am ok with that, by the way. Saves a lot of money.
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Antonioni (and DiVenanzo) L'eclisse almost 3 years ago
As Last Year in Marienbad, which I saw for the first time recently, it belongs to a certain canon of artsy, so-called “not easy to access” films. Personally I loved Antonioni (and especially L’Eclisse) right from the start while my relationship with Marienbad is rather difficult. Both have a reputation of being difficult but I always find Antonioni easier to just give in to the beauty. He does not force you to think all the time, I guess.
Go to Comment
IS CITIZEN KANE THE GREATEST MOVIE EVER MADE OR JUST THE BEST HYPED? almost 3 years ago
For me Citizen Kane is such a great classic because you can study a lot of film techniques watching it – as regards to the storytelling, editing, deep focus or simply the sophisticated technical achievements (which have been listed in this thread already). That does not make it the best film ever, of course. It is still fun to make such lists, though.
Go to Comment
IS CITIZEN KANE THE GREATEST MOVIE EVER MADE OR JUST THE BEST HYPED? almost 3 years ago
For me Citizen Kane is such a great classic because you can study a lot of film techniques watching it – as regards to the storytelling, editing, deep focus or simply the sophisticated technical achievements (which have been listed in this thread already). That does not make it the best film ever, of course. It is still fun to make such lists, though.
Go to Comment
What is the problem with toda's mainstream cinema? almost 3 years ago
I was about to answer: Well, mainstream has completely devoted itself to the ever same ingredients, to the ever same formula – be it in action, be it in romcom. But then I thought: Wait, didn’t they rely on certain fixed structures in the old days, too? Maybe the difference is: Then they worked freely with it, using it to their advantage and proving their capabilities by sticking to the structure, but at the same time filling it with new ideas?
But then: Weren’t there a lot of bad mainstream movies in the old days, too?
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Where are you from? almost 3 years ago
Germany, Cologne
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How could such a great director make such a lousy movie? almost 3 years ago
Tarantino, Four Rooms (1995). This is really unbelievable bad, and Tarantinos part still is the best of the four episodes in this collaborative work. The whole thing is a pain to watch. Four Rooms may be the lousiest film of all the other participating directors, too (Robert Rodriguez, Alexandre Rockwell, Allison Anders).
Go to Comment
How important is a perfect image quality for cinephiles? almost 3 years ago
I recently bought a blu-ray player and am quite happy with it – the print of Chungking Express just looks marvellous and is fun to watch – so I would not say blu-ray only appeals to the fans of Dark Knight, 300 and other action flicks. But if I look back into the days before all this advanced technology I find myself not even caring about such stuff. I watched bad VHS-copies and even worse prints in cheap cinemas. Even today a film club here in town shows classic movies in rather bad condition, not stopping me and a lot of other film buffs to go seeing them. It still is the movie that counts, isn’t it? Or maybe getting used to dvd and blu-ray will increase our sensitivity and make us care more and more about things whose correct technical denotation I still cannot force myself to remember?
Or are we just about to get to cinematic heaven, and at the same time realising that until now we have been in hell?
Go to Comment
How important is a perfect image quality for cinephiles? almost 3 years ago
film grain and blu-ray are not necessarily in opposition. With old films, the blu-ray often preserves that cellulloid-feeling, for example in my blu-ray of Raging Bull, and also in Chungking Express there is lots of grain. With new films it is a different story. M. Manns Hi-Def Public Enemies, judging from the trailer, indeed does not look like film anymore.
Go to Comment
How important is a perfect image quality for cinephiles? almost 3 years ago
Richard, I very much agree, especially to your last sentence:
“The day we say that watching a film in anything less than 1080p is “not really watching the film”, is the day that we have pretty much given in to visual snobbery.”
Also, I do not want to invest a considerable amount of time in learning technical stuff regarding the perfect home theater experience or whatever. I want to watch films. Period.
Go to Comment
How important is a perfect image quality for cinephiles? almost 3 years ago
@Jacob
No need to be depressed ;-)
Of course I know some stuff and find it interesting to a certain degree. But reading blu-ray and dvd-reviews that only refer to the tech specs makes me yawn. I once surfed through Hi-Fi forums when I was looking for a LCD TV and Blu Ray player and such, and boy did I understand little.
That was my point to start this whole thread: Having Chungking Express and Ran in a never before seen quality is nice, but for me not the most important thing about films. And I hope it will remain being like this. With all the new developments it might change – you know, paying eight euros für a night in a cinema with bad projection while knowing that I could watch this at home in better quality …
Go to Comment
How important is a perfect image quality for cinephiles? almost 3 years ago
Well, I just saw 2001, Lawrence of Arabia, Hello Dolly, Mutiny on the Bounty and West Side Story in 70mm at the Berlinale Retrospective this year – and it totally blew me away. So yes, image quality matters to me. And combined with the cinema experience it is priceless (of course you only get superiour quality on film festivals). And it is very valuable, what the dvd culture (and critereion et al) do for film – making it available in the best possible transfer. So, really, I start getting hooked on image quality, and sense a certain change of heart with myself. That’s why I started this thread. It would be sad, if the new technology was not used to give the films the treatment they deserve, wouldn’t it? I like properly edited books and well restored paintings, too.
Go to Comment
5 Films you saw that are considered masterpieces that you thought were overated,horrible or you just "didnt like" almost 3 years ago
I don’t say these are overrated, I just say they did not do it for me, for whatever reason:
Theodoros Angelopoulos: Ulysses’ Gaze (I’d rather read Homer backwards in greek with my head in a vice!)
Blues Brothers (probably because I saw it too late in life)
Lord of the Rings (good for one viewing, but that’s it)
Christian Petzold’s Gespenster (trying too hard to be different; I like most of his other stuff, though)
Fellini’s Casanova just makes me nervous.
Also I would not say that Forrest Gump is considered a masterpiece. It was just a very successful movie, but also dumped by a lot of critics. So though I do not like it very much I would rather not put it on this list.
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5 Films you saw that are considered masterpieces that you thought were overated,horrible or you just "didnt like" almost 3 years ago
Roscoe, still I got laughed at by friends for being a cinerati, who knows so much movies, but has never seen Blues Brothers, a film which everybody in the world seems to know. : -)
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5 Films you saw that are considered masterpieces that you thought were overated,horrible or you just "didnt like" almost 3 years ago
another one: Bressons Lancelot du Lac. I found the exaggerated noises of the metal armour produced a rather comic effect. Felt like Monty Python without the jokes.
I also could not help being bored by Procès de Jeanne d’Arc and L’argent, but maybe I just have to see them again. Balthasar and Mouchette on the contrary I find very touching.
And Raging Bull is nothing less than fantastic: a quite deep exploration of really annoying characters and simply the most beautiful b/w photography I know of. (just bought the blu-ray and was blown away). And of course Cathy Moriarty!
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5 Films you saw that are considered masterpieces that you thought were overated,horrible or you just "didnt like" almost 3 years ago
@RAWDEALBUFFY Jules et Jim is really not about being french. One of the title characters, Oskar Werner’s Jules, is austrian anyway. ;-)
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James Toback almost 3 years ago
Recently I ran into a retrospective of Tobacks work during a german festival. I had heard of “Fingers” but was quite unaware of his other work. While he surely has a rather unorthodox style without being the best director alive I still liked what i saw. Especially his lacking interest in plot, but rather going for situation (I remeber a dancing Nastassja Kinski in Exposed and a maybe 5 minute long wordfight on Times Square at the beginning of When will I be loved. Very few films of Toback are shown or available in Germany. I wonder if he has a strong following in the US. Any Toback fans here?
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James Toback almost 3 years ago
Rudy V, I guess I was lucky that I saw Exposed. It was part of said retrospective, and the man himself was there to talk about his films (something he apparantly very much enjoyed). I can also recommend the documentary about Toback that you mention, it draws a lively picture. About Tyson I was a bit unsure. It is an interesting interview with him, made stylish by using some sort of splitscreen stuff. Toback used a digicam here so he could film tons of footage, which resulted in some really good moments. But all in all it is just an interview.
I would guess that people who like Toback like Ferrara as well.
Go to Comment
Foreign films for beginners almost 3 years ago
Stuff like Antoinoni or Wong Kar-Wei is surely not your parent’s cup of tea if they think that all foreign movies ar bad. Something more easily digestible (because of a real storyline) can be Rosselinis Rome, Open City (fight against Nazis, produced very shortly after WW2). 7 Samurai I’d say is far too long for beginners and from a culture too far from their own (they may always like The Magnificent Seven better). Anyway, foreign film does not neccessarily mean Arthouse, and especially not Arthouse from decades ago. The French do some decent Action Cinema (Les Rivières pourpres, L’Empire des Loups) and some comedy. There are breathtaking thrillers from Hongkong (Infernal Affairs I-III).
You also can check out Almodovars latest Volver, I’d say it is his most mainstream (but still Almodovar!). From Germany I’d recommend The Tin Drum and Life of Others (Oscar Winners!); Run, Lola Run; and maybe some Fassbinder. Go for Lola for starters.
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Help make The Auteurs totally awesome almost 3 years ago
I am not sure what the wall is for. Is it supposed to be a kind of a guestbook or is the user himself supposed to write on it? Or both? And why do that instead of sending a message to someone?
One more thing: The database of watchable films is growing, but there is no way to detect which films are new to watch in my country. I would like to have a column on the start page, or maybe a message to my account, everytime films are added, with the titles named. And only the ones I actually can watch. Otherwise I have to look through the whole database every other week or so.
Great site, by the way!
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FEMALE DIRECTORS almost 3 years ago
sorry for going a little OT:
This thread reminds me of a film critic class at university, long time ago. Upon receiving the list of films to watch for the semester, one girl complained there were no female directors on that list, except for Rosa von Praunheim …
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FEMALE DIRECTORS almost 3 years ago
@Kenji No, it was the opposite of witty. She really thought von Praunheim was a woman.
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5 Films you saw that are considered masterpieces that you thought were overated,horrible or you just "didnt like" almost 3 years ago
@RAWDEALBUFFY If I interpret Your words correctly than it is a more thorough storyline you miss, some objective or aim the characters should have. Well, maybe you are right, then french films are not for you ;-)
No, really: One can not honestly say that there is nothing happening, so Your Godot reference is far from, well, everything. I mean, there is even a car crash! :-) The men become friends, they fall in love, they quarrel over the same woman, they marry, they go to war (against each other!), one of them – and the woman – dies. And they are not the first generation after WWII. They fight in WW Number one. The novel on which the film is built is from the 50ies but describes an autobiographical story from the 10 and 20ies.
But Jules & Jim, which I saw many times but also a long time ago, for me never was a film where the plot itself was that important. It is about friendship and art. And about a lovingly impulsive woman. And about how this freely but deeply and unconventional attached people fail, because society pushes them somwhere else: the war makes them enemies, the morale would not allow a threesome etc.
(forgive my weak language, I am not a native speaker)
Still, this is on the level of what is this film about. Even more important is the question of: how is it done? How is the story told? And that’s where Truffaut comes in with his down-to-the-roots-storytelling, with his elaborate but at the same time very light camerawork. Every time I see J&J it just makes me feel good, like a glass of fresh lemon juice. And not like a modern day crowdpleaser, in which I can sense I am being manipulated all the time.
In the american sort of remake of J&J, called “Willie & Phil” from 1980, the two male characters get to know each other in New York after a cinema screening of J&J, on the boardwalk, talking about how special and life changing that film is. They then become friends and try to share the same woman, like in the original.
Go to Comment
5 Films you saw that are considered masterpieces that you thought were overated,horrible or you just "didnt like" almost 3 years ago
Bobby, I find that hard to believe, too. Plus Truffaut in general is much easier to relate to than to other french masters as Godard, Rivette or Rohmer.
Jules et Jim was made in the sixties but is set before and shortly after World War one. Truffaut used old film techniques/styles from this period of time to tell his story, maybe that is what upsets you, Steve. I found it charming.
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5 Films you saw that are considered masterpieces that you thought were overated,horrible or you just "didnt like" almost 3 years ago
Yes, agreed, J&J are the forerunners of the 68ies, or at least correspond with them.
Rawdealbuffy, I don’t think there is something you “did not get” with the film that may change your level appreciation. I reckon it is one of those you love at first sight or never.
Also, I would like to add that in contrast to Justin I do like the characters very much, especially because of their inaccuracies. I do not understand what is wrong with Catherine. But then, I do understand the longing of the two men to make her happy.
Damn, I love this site, too.
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5 Films you saw that are considered masterpieces that you thought were overated,horrible or you just "didnt like" almost 3 years ago
I totally agree.
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CHARACTERS WHO MAKE ME LOVE THEM IN SPITE OF THEIR DEEP HUMAN FLAWS almost 3 years ago
I think this topic exists because of a discussion we had about Jules et Jim (et Catherine) on another thread. It’s a great idea.
- Tony Soprano
- most of the crooks from The Wire, expecially Omar
- Poppy
- of course Antoine Doinel
- Ethan Edwards
- Darth Vader (um, well …)
- The Man in Murnaus’s Sunrise
Go to Comment
Is Mumblecore worthy of Criterion almost 3 years ago
Bujalski’s Beeswax and Bradley Rust’s The Exploding Girl are the only films I’ve seen that can be regarded as Mumblecore. Both are very good. The former mainly in its way to treat the characters and because it interestingly deals with language. The latter also because of its visual strength.
So, regarding the question on top of this thread, I’d say yes, worthy of criterion. Just like every good film is.
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Slow MOTION in films. almost 3 years ago
very much more often than a good use of slow motion (as the scarcely noticable one in Raging Bull, while the camera concentrates on Jakes first wife cooking steaks, the poetic ones In The Mood For Love or the scary ones from David Lynch) I encounter a very bad one. Thank god I tend to forget them, but I still have a rather hostile initial reaction towards slow motion. It can be very annoying because of its redundancy and cheap use of effect. Very often a slow motion seems to have nothing more to say than: hey, audience, watch closely now. Even if there is nothing to see.
What is the function of a slow motion anyway, astheticaly-wise or plotwise?
Go to Comment
Things your're really sick of almost 3 years ago
A man and a woman hold some stuff together, maybe dishes or something while cleaning a table, or one hands something over to somebody, and it falls down into pieces. They both kneel to clear up the mess, when by accident their hands meet, they look each other in the eye – and realise that they have been in love.
This kind of scene to illustrate awakening love without spoken words may have been good the first few times it was used, but that must be long ago.
Go to Comment