It’s a film that tackles (though doesn’t answer – how could it?) the question of faith and god and challenging all the points of the two. With death imminent, I would wonder how I would interpret the film on my deathbed. Would it be different? Would I suddenly have a desire to “know god”?
Also the ending of the film is like a death; abrupt, startling, and leaves the audience (or the medical staff) unsure whether any knowledge was gained.
End quote
Winter Light is a fantastic choice. Bergman is a great source for picks in this situation I think. Between Winter Light and The Seventh Seal I would be pleased.
However since Shotzi is requiring we pick one definitive film, I will say Robert Bresson’s Diary of a Country Priest. It’s the perfect movie of a man trying to obey and do the work of God, sometimes feeling like a failure, but discovering in the end the monumental work God used him to do in a seemingly little thing at the time. He discovers this on his own deathbed as well, so I would say this film would be my choice.
I was however very tempted to chose a Looney Tunes movie because for some reason I always felt there would be a great satisfaction in knowing the last thing I ever heard on this earth would be Porky Pig reciting his famous stuttering “That’s All Folks”
I don’t know about who I would want to fight, but I have some ideas about which two directors I would like to fight each other.
Fat Peter Jackson vs. Fat Guillermo Del Toro. I know they will both be working together on The Hobbit so they will come in contact and maybe have some kind of disputes. I just wish they were both fat again when they start dueling with their big Middle-Earth props.
Jaques Tati vs. Buster Keaton. Don’t tell me this couldn’t be one of the most captivating things ever put to film.
Samuel Fuller vs. John Carpenter. I don’t have a real good reason for this one. They actually kind of look the same to me. And they both seem hard as nails when they want to be.
Werner Herzog vs. Errol Morris. I know these guys are friends and that any fight would actually turn into an interview with Morris asking the most amazing questions and Herzog giving the most fascinating answers. In fact, why isn’t something like this already out there for me to view? Or am I just not aware of it?
Yuen Woo-ping vs. George Lucas. Come on, you want to see Lucas get his teeth kicked in don’t you?
I don’t know about who I would want to fight, but I have some ideas about which two directors I would like to fight each other.
Fat Peter Jackson vs. Fat Guillermo Del Toro. I know they will both be working together on The Hobbit so they will come in contact and maybe have some kind of disputes. I just wish they were both fat again when they start dueling with their big Middle-Earth props.
Jaques Tati vs. Buster Keaton. Don’t tell me this couldn’t be one of the most captivating things ever put to film.
Samuel Fuller vs. John Carpenter. I don’t have a real good reason for this one. They actually kind of look the same to me. And they both seem hard as nails when they want to be.
Werner Herzog vs. Errol Morris. I know these guys are friends and that any fight would actually turn into an interview with Morris asking the most amazing questions and Herzog giving the most fascinating answers. In fact, why isn’t something like this already out there for me to view? Or am I just not aware of it?
Yuen Woo-ping vs. George Lucas. Come on, you want to see Lucas get his teeth kicked in don’t you?
I have extremely fond memories of Ernest. When I was a kid I thought he was the greatest. I would even cut his photo out of the ABC Warehouse ads in the newspaper.
I really do think that Jim Varney was a talented and varried comedic actor, although he wasn’t given as much opportunity to show that as he would have liked. You can see it in many of the Ernest movies and the Ernest TV show and Dr. Otto and the Riddle of the Gloom beam. He was actually an accomplished Shakespearean actor for a time as I recall hearing, but those types of roles never came for him on the screen.
There is some smart and subversive stuff in some of these movies even though it is aimed to children. I watched Ernest Goes to Jail again somewhat recently and still thought it was a wonderful film. Made me happy. I don’t know if Cherry was the greatest writer as the two best Ernest films Ernest Goes to Jail and Ernest Saves Christmas were not penned by him. I think you would really have to look at Jim Varney, John Cherry, and sometimes writer/director/producer Coke Sams as kind of the team behind all of these movies.
Masaki Kobayashi
Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid
Slaughterhouse-Five
The Sting
While I cannot say that I have seen everyone one of these, I have seen most of them. And the few others I know by reputation. I’m not making a claim as to which one is the best, but I’m surprised they were not offered as contenders.
I feel like one of my favorite directors Hal Hartley needs a picture and quote on his page:
http://www.theauteurs.com/cast_members/10950
I’ve attached a suggested picture and below is a suggested quote:
“Despite the fact that I love story, character and dialogue, when I isolate the primary elements of film I find photography, movement and sound recording — in that order. Only then do I consider dramatic action. Film is essentially graphic for me.”
I had that movie recommended to me by a lot of recommendation sites and heard it talked well of quite often. I found it to have too many of my turn offs. Hedonistic characters and precocious child protagonist.
I was in the wilderness without internet until last evening, but I’m back now for good. I’ll be quite responsive from now on I assure you! I’ve submitted my Hartley movie so hopefully I’m not too late.
Alright, I don’t feel too bad about not making it into the cup now because being a participant in watching, discussing, and voting seems pretty exciting. What a great idea!
Quote:
I keep going back to the Forties and Fifties for films, I go back to the Twenties and Thirties for music. For some reason I really like these films from the Forties and Fifties, whether they’re American, French, whatever… I can’t quite put my finger on it, “dark” is the best way I know to describe the quality that I like in them. Now it’s just kind of a cultural desert out there, to me.
I remember walking into Ravenous knowing nothing about it and being so delighted! You are right that the score from Albarn puts the movie on a higher level. For me it puts it on the top shelf. I think the juxtiposition of the quotes at the beginning of the film set the tone:
“He that fights with monsters should look to himself that he does not become a monster.”
—Nietzsche
Quote:
“For me, the present is a golden era that’s ending too. That’s the greatest golden era. Right now. [Laughs.] I just like pining for lost times. I can pine for this morning.”
Only my second Kiarostami film. I saw Taste of Cherry and thought it was fairly good, but not enough for me to go out and look for any of his other films. I’m glad I saw this one now though, even though I was hesitant initially because for some reason I am put off by the majority of films with child protagonists.
I think it’s difficult to make good films about children, at least ones that I find affecting. Too may kids in films are too precocious. Man, that really puts me off for some reason. But this film is great. It made me so sympathetic for the kid. I agree with Cecil that so many scenes made me frustrated. It is pretty rare that I watch a film and get so frustrated that I just want to step into it that much and scream “would you just fucking listen to the kid for a minute!!!!”
I agree it was great in its simplicity.
BTW, I see another rare good film about a child coming up in the Director’s Cup. The Children are Watching Us.
I guess I was far from alone when I kept thinking of Tarr when I saw this. Actually the only of his movies I’ve seen I Werckmeister Harmonies, even though no one mentioned that particular film in their comparisons.
I was captivated with this one too. I could have watched that sheet burning all day (but maybe I’m just a bit of a pyromaniac). For a while watching it I was getting a bit anxious to know more of the context. In the end I appreciated it as a beautiful, laconic observation of an alienated community. And I’m a big sucker for that kind of thing.
I would like to check out more of Bartas work, but do think I will pick Kiarostami’s selection this round. It takes a little more narrative in a film to make me really love it. Nothing super complicated, but nice and simple like Where is the Friend’s Home?
Blue K, do any of Bartas’s other works approach more of a traditional narrative with a little more insight into characters’ histories or motives?
@ Cecil. Ah yes, Nobody Knows is another child focused film in the competition. I know a lot of people are ga ga for it, but I found it a bit disappointing. We’ll get to that later though. ;)
I’m surprised so many people are confused about the conversations between the old men. I think the film wouldn’t have worked without it. I found it to be an important center to the film. We share the child’s point of view at the beginning which for me is a bit baffling about the way the adults around him act. But then at this point in the film we center in and see how the adults have been trained into this mentality by their own experience. The relative of the boy who makes him get the cigarettes that he doesn’t need has been trained by his relatives and the rest of society to discipline the kid in this kind of absurd way. The child’s view has a more innocent kind of morality and logic. But society and his upbringing will soon sculpt him into being one of these dissatisfied adults, eventually hard locked into a certain somewhat absurd and focused way of thinking where all of their communication turns into talking at people instead of having real communications. Communication turns into who is in authority will repeat what they want over and over, and the person who gets rewarded is the one who follows the instructions as promptly with the least ammount of questioning and resistance. It even turns into something quantifiable. “How many times did I tell you to do your homework?” and he intends on getting a numerical response. Or the guy who has to be told twice what to do gets half as much pay.
Once the conversation is over it brings more insight into the rest of the film in my opinion.
““informal and supercilious” to describe bronze age nonsensical gibberish?
Where is the problem?”"
Well what is the purpose of such annotations if you don’t want to be taken seriously? If you are going to describe your criticisms of the BIble in a website it must be because you feel as though you have something important and well thought out to communicate to the people. If everyone shared your belief that the Bible was “bronze age nonsensical gibberish” there wouldn’t be a point for such a website with these annotations. But if you want the reader to take the criticisms seriously, it might be better to take a less biased tone. The blunt and snarky comments reveal the author is just writing it to spout off some of his own frustrations but without any real thought on how to communicate them effectively to people who don’t already share his viewpoint.
I’ve seen this film before and don’t have time to rewatch it because of so many other films in the competition I need to find time for, but I really wish I had time to re-watch it.
The Enigma of Kaspar Hauser is probably one of my top five favorite films of all time, so I certainly have a love for the Herzog and Bruno S. pairing.
One of the best things about Herzog films are that the stories about the making of the film are always just as good as the film itself. I guess that’s part of Herzog’s wonderful vision of ecstatic truth only being found through a mix of fiction and non-fiction, both in his explicitly narrative films and explicitly documentary films. Both have the mix. Thus the commentary Herzog records for his movies are usually just as good or better than watching the actual film. Not to mention I just love the pronunciation and cadence of the man’s voice.
Let me describe what I remember Herzog saying about the history behind the Wisconsin sets in the film. At one time he and the great Errol Morris were planning on doing a document about about famous serial killer Ed Gein (they were good friends who one time conducted an interview with serial killer Edmund Kemper). I’m sure most of you have heard of Ed Gein, the man who Psycho and many other films were inspired by. He dug up dead women and made clothes and other things out of their body parts. He also had an obsession with his mother. Herzog and Morris made a pact to secretly dig up the grave of Gein’s mother to see if he had disturbed it at all. On the scheduled day Herzog showed up to the place in Wisconsin, but Morris never came.
During this trip to Wisconsin, Herzog had car trouble and brought his car to a mechanic. He couldn’t forget the owner and employee who worked on his car and their interesting relationship. When writing Stroszek he decided to set it in Wisconsin and return to the location around where he took this trip. When making the film he returned to the mechanic’s garage he had been to years before. He wanted to film in that same location and cast those same two mechanics in the film. He found the same owner still working there but couldn’t find the other employee. He inquired about the whareabouts employee with the owner, but the owner initially couldn’t remember who he was talking about. After much long discussion the owner finally remembered the person Herzog remembered was a man the owner had hired for one day, and they got along so poorly that he fired him the next day. Herzog was surprised because he felt like their relationship was so interesting and strong when he met them. Herzog managed to track down the other man, and ended up casting them both in the film. When one of the guys in the film pulls out his own tooth, this is REAL!!! Herzog didn’t even script this from what I recall. The guy just had a toothache and said he was going to pull the tooth out so Herzog let him do it and filmed it.
I also have to say that “Can’t stop the dancing chickens. Send an electrician, we’re standing by.” has to be one of the best last lines in film history.
If Le Boucher is Charbrol’s best work, I don’t want to see the rest. I watched this one recently and was highly disappointed. I really can’t see the fuss about this one. Also I thought Stéphane Audran was creepier than the killer. Just the way she looks. A freaky women. Don’t know why people think she is so beautiful. Obviously I’m in the minority with all of these opinions.
Answer This Awesome Question I Am About to Ask over 2 years ago
Quoting Deckard Croix
Winter Light.
It’s a film that tackles (though doesn’t answer – how could it?) the question of faith and god and challenging all the points of the two. With death imminent, I would wonder how I would interpret the film on my deathbed. Would it be different? Would I suddenly have a desire to “know god”?
Also the ending of the film is like a death; abrupt, startling, and leaves the audience (or the medical staff) unsure whether any knowledge was gained.
End quote
Winter Light is a fantastic choice. Bergman is a great source for picks in this situation I think. Between Winter Light and The Seventh Seal I would be pleased.
However since Shotzi is requiring we pick one definitive film, I will say Robert Bresson’s Diary of a Country Priest. It’s the perfect movie of a man trying to obey and do the work of God, sometimes feeling like a failure, but discovering in the end the monumental work God used him to do in a seemingly little thing at the time. He discovers this on his own deathbed as well, so I would say this film would be my choice.
I was however very tempted to chose a Looney Tunes movie because for some reason I always felt there would be a great satisfaction in knowing the last thing I ever heard on this earth would be Porky Pig reciting his famous stuttering “That’s All Folks”
Go to Comment
if you could fight any director who would it be over 2 years ago
I don’t know about who I would want to fight, but I have some ideas about which two directors I would like to fight each other.
Fat Peter Jackson vs. Fat Guillermo Del Toro. I know they will both be working together on The Hobbit so they will come in contact and maybe have some kind of disputes. I just wish they were both fat again when they start dueling with their big Middle-Earth props.
Jaques Tati vs. Buster Keaton. Don’t tell me this couldn’t be one of the most captivating things ever put to film.
Samuel Fuller vs. John Carpenter. I don’t have a real good reason for this one. They actually kind of look the same to me. And they both seem hard as nails when they want to be.
Werner Herzog vs. Errol Morris. I know these guys are friends and that any fight would actually turn into an interview with Morris asking the most amazing questions and Herzog giving the most fascinating answers. In fact, why isn’t something like this already out there for me to view? Or am I just not aware of it?
Yuen Woo-ping vs. George Lucas. Come on, you want to see Lucas get his teeth kicked in don’t you?
Go to Comment
if you could fight any director who would it be over 2 years ago
I don’t know about who I would want to fight, but I have some ideas about which two directors I would like to fight each other.
Fat Peter Jackson vs. Fat Guillermo Del Toro. I know they will both be working together on The Hobbit so they will come in contact and maybe have some kind of disputes. I just wish they were both fat again when they start dueling with their big Middle-Earth props.
Jaques Tati vs. Buster Keaton. Don’t tell me this couldn’t be one of the most captivating things ever put to film.
Samuel Fuller vs. John Carpenter. I don’t have a real good reason for this one. They actually kind of look the same to me. And they both seem hard as nails when they want to be.
Werner Herzog vs. Errol Morris. I know these guys are friends and that any fight would actually turn into an interview with Morris asking the most amazing questions and Herzog giving the most fascinating answers. In fact, why isn’t something like this already out there for me to view? Or am I just not aware of it?
Yuen Woo-ping vs. George Lucas. Come on, you want to see Lucas get his teeth kicked in don’t you?
Go to Comment
John R Cherry III (Ernest director) and Joe Camp (Benji director) over 2 years ago
I have extremely fond memories of Ernest. When I was a kid I thought he was the greatest. I would even cut his photo out of the ABC Warehouse ads in the newspaper.
I really do think that Jim Varney was a talented and varried comedic actor, although he wasn’t given as much opportunity to show that as he would have liked. You can see it in many of the Ernest movies and the Ernest TV show and Dr. Otto and the Riddle of the Gloom beam. He was actually an accomplished Shakespearean actor for a time as I recall hearing, but those types of roles never came for him on the screen.
There is some smart and subversive stuff in some of these movies even though it is aimed to children. I watched Ernest Goes to Jail again somewhat recently and still thought it was a wonderful film. Made me happy. I don’t know if Cherry was the greatest writer as the two best Ernest films Ernest Goes to Jail and Ernest Saves Christmas were not penned by him. I think you would really have to look at Jim Varney, John Cherry, and sometimes writer/director/producer Coke Sams as kind of the team behind all of these movies.
Go to Comment
John R Cherry III (Ernest director) and Joe Camp (Benji director) over 2 years ago
Thanks, I’ll check that out.
Go to Comment
Best 3 Consecutive Films by a Director over 2 years ago
While there are a few here I think would compete, here are a few I am shocked haven’t been named yet in all these several pages of posts:
Robert Bresson
Diary of a Country Priest
A Man Escaped
Pickpocket
Vittorio De Sica
The Bicycle Thieves
Miracle in Milan
Umberto D.
Andrzej Wajda
A Generation
Kanal
Ashes and Diamonds
Seijun Suzuki
Tokyo Drifter
Fighting Elegy
Branded to Kill
Masaki Kobayashi
Harakiri
Kwaidan
Samurai Rebellion
Masaki Kobayashi
Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid
Slaughterhouse-Five
The Sting
While I cannot say that I have seen everyone one of these, I have seen most of them. And the few others I know by reputation. I’m not making a claim as to which one is the best, but I’m surprised they were not offered as contenders.
Go to Comment
IF WE IGNORE 81/2 AND DOLCE VITA, WHAT'D BE THE BEST FELLINI MOVIE? over 2 years ago
What? Drop Dead Fred is a remake of a Fellini movie
Go to Comment
The Auteurs Film & Cast Member Database about 2 years ago
I feel like one of my favorite directors Hal Hartley needs a picture and quote on his page:
http://www.theauteurs.com/cast_members/10950
I’ve attached a suggested picture and below is a suggested quote:
“Despite the fact that I love story, character and dialogue, when I isolate the primary elements of film I find photography, movement and sound recording — in that order. Only then do I consider dramatic action. Film is essentially graphic for me.”
Thanks for the consideration,
Brian
Go to Comment
The Director's Cup - Choosing Directors to Manage about 2 years ago
Can I take Hal Hartley?
Go to Comment
MUBI: VOTE about 2 years ago
I preferred “theauteurs.com”: (80)
I prefer “mubi.com”: (1)
I would prefer another name: (2)
Go to Comment
most disappointing film ever about 2 years ago
Recently,
The Tin Drum
I had that movie recommended to me by a lot of recommendation sites and heard it talked well of quite often. I found it to have too many of my turn offs. Hedonistic characters and precocious child protagonist.
Go to Comment
The Directors' Cup - Stage 2; Choosing the films for Round 1 about 2 years ago
I’m sorry mob, don’t take me to the stake!!!
I was in the wilderness without internet until last evening, but I’m back now for good. I’ll be quite responsive from now on I assure you! I’ve submitted my Hartley movie so hopefully I’m not too late.
Go to Comment
The Directors' Cup - Stage 2; Choosing the films for Round 1 about 2 years ago
Shit. It looks like I’m too late…..
Damn rural Wisconsin for being so beautiful and devoid of wordly communications.
Go to Comment
The Directors' Cup - Stage 2; Choosing the films for Round 1 about 2 years ago
Henry Fool
Go to Comment
The Directors' Cup - Stage 2; Choosing the films for Round 1 about 2 years ago
Mine too! But he has some other great contenders that would have worked in subsequent rounds too. So sad.
Go to Comment
The Directors' Cup - Stage 2; Choosing the films for Round 1 about 2 years ago
Just bad timing on my part.
But I was helping my girlfriend shoot a documentary up there, and it was productive, so I guess it was worth it.
Go to Comment
The Director’s Cup – Film Discussions about 2 years ago
Alright, I don’t feel too bad about not making it into the cup now because being a participant in watching, discussing, and voting seems pretty exciting. What a great idea!
Go to Comment
The Auteurs Film & Cast Member Database about 2 years ago
Terry Zwigoff
Quote:
I keep going back to the Forties and Fifties for films, I go back to the Twenties and Thirties for music. For some reason I really like these films from the Forties and Fifties, whether they’re American, French, whatever… I can’t quite put my finger on it, “dark” is the best way I know to describe the quality that I like in them. Now it’s just kind of a cultural desert out there, to me.
Go to Comment
Is Ravenous the best film about cannibals ever made? about 2 years ago
I remember walking into Ravenous knowing nothing about it and being so delighted! You are right that the score from Albarn puts the movie on a higher level. For me it puts it on the top shelf. I think the juxtiposition of the quotes at the beginning of the film set the tone:
“He that fights with monsters should look to himself that he does not become a monster.”
—Nietzsche
“Eat me.”
—Anonymous
Go to Comment
The Auteurs Film & Cast Member Database about 2 years ago
Whit Stillman
Quote:
“For me, the present is a golden era that’s ending too. That’s the greatest golden era. Right now. [Laughs.] I just like pining for lost times. I can pine for this morning.”
Go to Comment
Director’s Cup- Film Analysis: (Where Is The Friend's Home?) by (Abbas Kiarostami) about 2 years ago
Just watched it this weekend.
Only my second Kiarostami film. I saw Taste of Cherry and thought it was fairly good, but not enough for me to go out and look for any of his other films. I’m glad I saw this one now though, even though I was hesitant initially because for some reason I am put off by the majority of films with child protagonists.
I think it’s difficult to make good films about children, at least ones that I find affecting. Too may kids in films are too precocious. Man, that really puts me off for some reason. But this film is great. It made me so sympathetic for the kid. I agree with Cecil that so many scenes made me frustrated. It is pretty rare that I watch a film and get so frustrated that I just want to step into it that much and scream “would you just fucking listen to the kid for a minute!!!!”
I agree it was great in its simplicity.
BTW, I see another rare good film about a child coming up in the Director’s Cup. The Children are Watching Us.
Go to Comment
If I were to ask you to recommend a film that is totally unlike any I would have seen... about 2 years ago
Last Year at Marienbad – Alain Resnais
What Is It? – Crispin Glover
Sans soleil – Chris Marker
Go to Comment
The Auteurs & MUBI about 2 years ago
Splitting the site in half? That sounds like it could be pretty confusing.
Will there be some features currently on The Auteurs that will be leaving and going with MUBI?
How will you pick which content goes where???
Where will the forums be?
I am afraid of having to choose allegiance or going back and forth. Schizophrenia!
Go to Comment
Director’s Cup- Film Analysis: The Corridor by Sharunas Bartas about 2 years ago
I guess I was far from alone when I kept thinking of Tarr when I saw this. Actually the only of his movies I’ve seen I Werckmeister Harmonies, even though no one mentioned that particular film in their comparisons.
I was captivated with this one too. I could have watched that sheet burning all day (but maybe I’m just a bit of a pyromaniac). For a while watching it I was getting a bit anxious to know more of the context. In the end I appreciated it as a beautiful, laconic observation of an alienated community. And I’m a big sucker for that kind of thing.
I would like to check out more of Bartas work, but do think I will pick Kiarostami’s selection this round. It takes a little more narrative in a film to make me really love it. Nothing super complicated, but nice and simple like Where is the Friend’s Home?
Blue K, do any of Bartas’s other works approach more of a traditional narrative with a little more insight into characters’ histories or motives?
Go to Comment
Director’s Cup- Film Analysis: (Where Is The Friend's Home?) by (Abbas Kiarostami) about 2 years ago
@ Cecil. Ah yes, Nobody Knows is another child focused film in the competition. I know a lot of people are ga ga for it, but I found it a bit disappointing. We’ll get to that later though. ;)
I’m surprised so many people are confused about the conversations between the old men. I think the film wouldn’t have worked without it. I found it to be an important center to the film. We share the child’s point of view at the beginning which for me is a bit baffling about the way the adults around him act. But then at this point in the film we center in and see how the adults have been trained into this mentality by their own experience. The relative of the boy who makes him get the cigarettes that he doesn’t need has been trained by his relatives and the rest of society to discipline the kid in this kind of absurd way. The child’s view has a more innocent kind of morality and logic. But society and his upbringing will soon sculpt him into being one of these dissatisfied adults, eventually hard locked into a certain somewhat absurd and focused way of thinking where all of their communication turns into talking at people instead of having real communications. Communication turns into who is in authority will repeat what they want over and over, and the person who gets rewarded is the one who follows the instructions as promptly with the least ammount of questioning and resistance. It even turns into something quantifiable. “How many times did I tell you to do your homework?” and he intends on getting a numerical response. Or the guy who has to be told twice what to do gets half as much pay.
Once the conversation is over it brings more insight into the rest of the film in my opinion.
Go to Comment
The Book of Eli: Another Idiotic religious Movie about 2 years ago
Interesting link. Its unfortunate that it doesn’t use a very scholarly tone though. The tone is rather informal and supercilious.
Go to Comment
The Book of Eli: Another Idiotic religious Movie about 2 years ago
““informal and supercilious” to describe bronze age nonsensical gibberish?
Where is the problem?”"
Well what is the purpose of such annotations if you don’t want to be taken seriously? If you are going to describe your criticisms of the BIble in a website it must be because you feel as though you have something important and well thought out to communicate to the people. If everyone shared your belief that the Bible was “bronze age nonsensical gibberish” there wouldn’t be a point for such a website with these annotations. But if you want the reader to take the criticisms seriously, it might be better to take a less biased tone. The blunt and snarky comments reveal the author is just writing it to spout off some of his own frustrations but without any real thought on how to communicate them effectively to people who don’t already share his viewpoint.
Go to Comment
Meaningless Thread (Absmurdity) about 2 years ago
Why won’t someone just come over here and unleash
ah relief
Go to Comment
Director’s Cup- Film Analysis: Stroszek by Werner Herzog about 2 years ago
I’ve seen this film before and don’t have time to rewatch it because of so many other films in the competition I need to find time for, but I really wish I had time to re-watch it.
The Enigma of Kaspar Hauser is probably one of my top five favorite films of all time, so I certainly have a love for the Herzog and Bruno S. pairing.
One of the best things about Herzog films are that the stories about the making of the film are always just as good as the film itself. I guess that’s part of Herzog’s wonderful vision of ecstatic truth only being found through a mix of fiction and non-fiction, both in his explicitly narrative films and explicitly documentary films. Both have the mix. Thus the commentary Herzog records for his movies are usually just as good or better than watching the actual film. Not to mention I just love the pronunciation and cadence of the man’s voice.
Let me describe what I remember Herzog saying about the history behind the Wisconsin sets in the film. At one time he and the great Errol Morris were planning on doing a document about about famous serial killer Ed Gein (they were good friends who one time conducted an interview with serial killer Edmund Kemper). I’m sure most of you have heard of Ed Gein, the man who Psycho and many other films were inspired by. He dug up dead women and made clothes and other things out of their body parts. He also had an obsession with his mother. Herzog and Morris made a pact to secretly dig up the grave of Gein’s mother to see if he had disturbed it at all. On the scheduled day Herzog showed up to the place in Wisconsin, but Morris never came.
During this trip to Wisconsin, Herzog had car trouble and brought his car to a mechanic. He couldn’t forget the owner and employee who worked on his car and their interesting relationship. When writing Stroszek he decided to set it in Wisconsin and return to the location around where he took this trip. When making the film he returned to the mechanic’s garage he had been to years before. He wanted to film in that same location and cast those same two mechanics in the film. He found the same owner still working there but couldn’t find the other employee. He inquired about the whareabouts employee with the owner, but the owner initially couldn’t remember who he was talking about. After much long discussion the owner finally remembered the person Herzog remembered was a man the owner had hired for one day, and they got along so poorly that he fired him the next day. Herzog was surprised because he felt like their relationship was so interesting and strong when he met them. Herzog managed to track down the other man, and ended up casting them both in the film. When one of the guys in the film pulls out his own tooth, this is REAL!!! Herzog didn’t even script this from what I recall. The guy just had a toothache and said he was going to pull the tooth out so Herzog let him do it and filmed it.
I also have to say that “Can’t stop the dancing chickens. Send an electrician, we’re standing by.” has to be one of the best last lines in film history.
Go to Comment
Anyone Wants to Give Away Voting Secrets about 2 years ago
If Le Boucher is Charbrol’s best work, I don’t want to see the rest. I watched this one recently and was highly disappointed. I really can’t see the fuss about this one. Also I thought Stéphane Audran was creepier than the killer. Just the way she looks. A freaky women. Don’t know why people think she is so beautiful. Obviously I’m in the minority with all of these opinions.
Go to Comment