Her body of work speaks to how talented an actress she was. Her raw passion informed every aspect of her life. She threw herself into every role. Loved madly until tragedy, or circumstance, or some newer fiercer love… (“I’ve only slept with men I’ve been married to. How many women can make that claim?” Touché and point taken.) Mostly I remember how passionately, fiercely she rallied attention to the real human cost of HIV/AIDS really years before anyone would acknowledge it, in Hollywood or in government. She saw her friend suffer, witnessed the hurt that everyone wanted to forget or ignore, got mad and demanded action. She’d already demonstrated her personal resilience, suffering through countless surgeries and publicly battling addictions. But she took that same fiery passion (that others caricatured her as a man-eating, diamond-obsessed star for) and raised hell like only she could. Made a indelible impact and I think she is still so widely loved today partly because people respond to her basic decency and compassion.
A passage from a letter Burton wrote to Elizabeth toward the end of their relationship:
Prometheus was punished by the gods forever
and is still suffering in all of us for inventing fire
and stealing it from the gods.
I am forever punished by the gods
for being given the fire and trying to put it out.
The fire, of course, is you.
John Carpenter (They Live) – 1 vs. Gustav Deutsch (Film ist. 1-6) – 0
Andre the Giant clearly beats out Piper in the charisma department, no question. But I endorse Cinesthesia’s analysis. (Too busy to elaborate further today.)
In many countries around the world, if you break the law by stealing copyrighted content you can be sentenced to prison and heavily fined. But if Google catches you breaking copyright laws, the punishment is more akin to being caught smoking in the boys room in high school: You’re forced to take an online class at YouTube’s Copyright School.
Copyright School isn’t your normal edition of detention. Copyright violators are asked to watch a four-and-a-half minute minute video and then required to take a multiple choice quiz that asks questions pertaining to copyright. One question, for example, asks if music videos and photographs fall under copyright protection.
The copyright video is hosted by Russell, a cartoon pirate character, who inadvertently breaks copyright laws by taping scenes from a film in a movie theater and then uploading the clips to YouTube. (Russell does all this with what seems to be an Apple iPhone, not a Google Android device, by the way.)
In the past, Google suspended users from the site who broke copyright rules three times or more. In a company blog post, Google said that although the old rules were a “strong deterrent to copyright offenders,” the one-size-fits-all approach was sometimes unfair to users.
The company also said it will give certain limited users who have been suspended from the site in the past an opportunity to remedy their YouTube account, and return to the site, “contingent upon the successful completion of YouTube Copyright School, as well as a solid demonstrated record of good behavior over time.”
The new copyright policy updates, which were added to the site on Thursday, will take effect immediately.
Just want to clarify what time the voting ends. Instructions at the top of this thread say voting closes at 7PM GMT. House asked in another thread to shut down at 1PM CST (so 6PM GMT). I’m operating under the assumption that we go with the original instructions as no changes were posted in this thread, right? So we get another hour +/-?
I’ll confess that I am still agonizing over my vote in this round. It’s a challenge when faced with two such disparate but accomplished films. You try to objectively weigh each film’s technical merits and overall impact. On that basis, Sunrise for me is pure cinema – gorgeous, deeply felt and affecting. Berta’s Motives is far from perfect. But on the other hand, where Sunrise is a confection, BM challenged me and still resonates. Its subtleties and sparse beauty make me want to revisit it and see Guerin’s later work. The girl’s performance, the use of sound – there’s a lot to love. I stick by Berta’s Motives, not because it’s the underdog but because it was the real discovery. And for me, that’s what the Cup is all about. (But it could have gone either way! So subjective.)
I really regret missing out on the voting in this match (and a bunch of earlier ones). I saw (and loved) Dog Days last night but didn’t get to Mysterious X before cutoff. Been falling further and further behind in my viewing. Thankfully there’s a brief reprieve so I can catch my breath and bone up on the coming bouts! I promised myself I would watch any films I’d missed before voting in round 2 matchups, so I’m as in-the-loop as can be. (Given my current record, a tall order.)
I didn’t participate in last year’s Cup so I don’t have the same frame of reference. Having familiarity with other works by Émond and Ramsay, later rounds could be interesting.
I would point out that the tighter adjusted sched these opening weeks might be another contributing factor to lowered participation. Since the first groups got shifted, the Cup started later but everything got more condensed. (i.e. We’ve gone match-a-day for nearly three weeks, with only a couple days off, as opposed to the anticipated 4 matches per week.) Despite my own best intentions to watch many and watch early, once I started to get behind, with no off-match days to catch up, turned into an unwieldy beast. ;) Coming back to the original schedule from here on will help out a lot with my own viewing and voting, and I imagine maybe some other people’s who didn’t crack the whip early. Just to say that I wouldn’t infer too too much about support for these directors’, when lower vote turnout might as likely be a confluence of external factors.
Now I have to make sure I use this break to get ahead of the game, as opposed to taking a viewing break, or I’ll be back in my day-of double feature stress-athon again. :) Bring it.
Nuri Bilge Ceylan (Clouds of May) —1 vs. Frans Zwartjes (Spare Bed-Room) —0
I was somewhat detached at first in viewing Clouds of May, focusing probably too much on the meta and unsure what form the picture was ultimately taking narratively. Would this be the story of a family coming together in making a film; the story of the filming; the movie within a movie; was the movie a pretext for something else? This is one case where, in retrospect, I wish I had not read so much about the backstory of Clouds of May’s making beforehand. I went in with too much context and got way too analytical from the outset , nearly too objective to let the film’s heart reveal itself to me.
That heart crept in despite myself at a pretty specific moment, when Muzaffer screens older home video for his parents – in an attempt, probably, to persuade them to act in his latest project. The footage itself is quite breathtaking but their reactions to seeing themselves on screen are quietly moving. (No matter that his father has nodded off by the end.) It’s clear that they’ll participate, though his mother frequently (hilariously) entreats him to keeping looking for other actors.
At that point, Muzaffer returns to Istanbul for a time to prepare production and we follow his cast and family in the interim. The arc of the little Ali (played by the amazing Muhammad Zimbaoglu) is particularly brilliant.
What Ceylan accomplishes on a meager budget is remarkable. I’d already seen Three Monkeys but not had this visceral reaction (though I enjoyed it). Very eager to revisit it though. His work is so precise.
In any other context, I’d surely have voted for Spare Bed-Room. But Ceylan’s film completely won me over (and I was a very hardsell going in).
R.I.P. Elizabeth Taylor about 1 year ago
Her body of work speaks to how talented an actress she was. Her raw passion informed every aspect of her life. She threw herself into every role. Loved madly until tragedy, or circumstance, or some newer fiercer love… (“I’ve only slept with men I’ve been married to. How many women can make that claim?” Touché and point taken.) Mostly I remember how passionately, fiercely she rallied attention to the real human cost of HIV/AIDS really years before anyone would acknowledge it, in Hollywood or in government. She saw her friend suffer, witnessed the hurt that everyone wanted to forget or ignore, got mad and demanded action. She’d already demonstrated her personal resilience, suffering through countless surgeries and publicly battling addictions. But she took that same fiery passion (that others caricatured her as a man-eating, diamond-obsessed star for) and raised hell like only she could. Made a indelible impact and I think she is still so widely loved today partly because people respond to her basic decency and compassion.
A passage from a letter Burton wrote to Elizabeth toward the end of their relationship:
Prometheus was punished by the gods forever and is still suffering in all of us for inventing fire and stealing it from the gods. I am forever punished by the gods for being given the fire and trying to put it out. The fire, of course, is you.R. I. P.
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Directors' Cup 2011 Film Links about 1 year ago
Last I checked, I think all of the Round 1 films were on SMz. (Can’t confirm if any links are dead or not, though.)
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Directors' Cup 2011 Film Links about 1 year ago
Oh you’re right. Luckily it does play in my region on Mubi.
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DIRECTORS’ CUP 2011 VOTING, ROUND 1, MATCH 1: John Carpenter (They Live) vs Gustav Deutsch (Film ist. 1-6) about 1 year ago
John Carpenter (They Live) – 1 vs. Gustav Deutsch (Film ist. 1-6) – 0
Andre the Giant clearly beats out Piper in the charisma department, no question. But I endorse Cinesthesia’s analysis. (Too busy to elaborate further today.)
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Voting Secrets, Version 2.0 about 1 year ago
@ House – Found other links for Outcast, I’ll let you know if it’s legit in a bit.
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Voting Secrets, Version 2.0 about 1 year ago
^ Nope, it’s asking for a password too.
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Directors' Cup 2011 Film Links about 1 year ago
À propos streaming Cup films on YouTube… this “Bits” blog entry at the New York Times website:
(http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/04/14/youtube-sentences-copyright-offenders-to-school/?hp)
YouTube Sentences Copyright Offenders To School
In many countries around the world, if you break the law by stealing copyrighted content you can be sentenced to prison and heavily fined. But if Google catches you breaking copyright laws, the punishment is more akin to being caught smoking in the boys room in high school: You’re forced to take an online class at YouTube’s Copyright School.
Copyright School isn’t your normal edition of detention. Copyright violators are asked to watch a four-and-a-half minute minute video and then required to take a multiple choice quiz that asks questions pertaining to copyright. One question, for example, asks if music videos and photographs fall under copyright protection.
The copyright video is hosted by Russell, a cartoon pirate character, who inadvertently breaks copyright laws by taping scenes from a film in a movie theater and then uploading the clips to YouTube. (Russell does all this with what seems to be an Apple iPhone, not a Google Android device, by the way.)
In the past, Google suspended users from the site who broke copyright rules three times or more. In a company blog post, Google said that although the old rules were a “strong deterrent to copyright offenders,” the one-size-fits-all approach was sometimes unfair to users.
The company also said it will give certain limited users who have been suspended from the site in the past an opportunity to remedy their YouTube account, and return to the site, “contingent upon the successful completion of YouTube Copyright School, as well as a solid demonstrated record of good behavior over time.”
The new copyright policy updates, which were added to the site on Thursday, will take effect immediately.
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DIRECTORS' CUP 2011 VOTING, ROUND 1, MATCH 10: Ritwik Ghatak (The Cloud-Capped Star) vs Todd Haynes (Safe) about 1 year ago
Ritwik Ghatak (The Cloud-Capped Star) – 0 vs Todd Haynes (Safe) – 1
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DIRECTORS’ CUP 2011 VOTING, ROUND 1, MATCH 11: F.W. Murnau (Sunrise) vs José Luis Guerín (Berta's Motives) about 1 year ago
Just want to clarify what time the voting ends. Instructions at the top of this thread say voting closes at 7PM GMT. House asked in another thread to shut down at 1PM CST (so 6PM GMT). I’m operating under the assumption that we go with the original instructions as no changes were posted in this thread, right? So we get another hour +/-?
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DIRECTORS’ CUP 2011 VOTING, ROUND 1, MATCH 11: F.W. Murnau (Sunrise) vs José Luis Guerín (Berta's Motives) about 1 year ago
F.W. Murnau (Sunrise) —0 vs. José Luis Guerin (Berta’s Motives) —1
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DIRECTORS’ CUP 2011 VOTING, ROUND 1, MATCH 11: F.W. Murnau (Sunrise) vs José Luis Guerín (Berta's Motives) about 1 year ago
I’ll confess that I am still agonizing over my vote in this round. It’s a challenge when faced with two such disparate but accomplished films. You try to objectively weigh each film’s technical merits and overall impact. On that basis, Sunrise for me is pure cinema – gorgeous, deeply felt and affecting. Berta’s Motives is far from perfect. But on the other hand, where Sunrise is a confection, BM challenged me and still resonates. Its subtleties and sparse beauty make me want to revisit it and see Guerin’s later work. The girl’s performance, the use of sound – there’s a lot to love. I stick by Berta’s Motives, not because it’s the underdog but because it was the real discovery. And for me, that’s what the Cup is all about. (But it could have gone either way! So subjective.)
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DIRECTORS’ CUP 2011 VOTING, ROUND 1, MATCH 11: F.W. Murnau (Sunrise) vs José Luis Guerín (Berta's Motives) about 1 year ago
Oh I already did, just before 2PM my time to be sure. Been second-guessing myself is all. ;)
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Directors' Cup: General Announcements Thread about 1 year ago
For Round 2, we’re reverting back to Group 1 followed by 2 followed by 3, right?
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DIRECTORS’ CUP 2011 VOTING, ROUND 1, MATCH 12: Edwin (Blind Pig Who Wants to Fly) vs Michael Winterbottom (Wonderland) about 1 year ago
Believe it’s another tie: 17-17
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DIRECTORS’ CUP 2011 VOTING, ROUND 1, MATCH 12: Edwin (Blind Pig Who Wants to Fly) vs Michael Winterbottom (Wonderland) about 1 year ago
Edwin (Blind Pig Who Wants to Fly) —1 vs. Michael Winterbottom (Wonderland) —0
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DIRECTORS’ CUP 2011 VOTING, ROUND 1, MATCH 14: Fritz Lang (Dr Mabuse: The Gambler) vs. Louis Malle (God’s Country) about 1 year ago
What a match…
Fritz Lang (Dr Mabuse: The Gambler) —0 vs. Louis Malle (God’s Country) —1
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DIRECTORS’ CUP 2011 VOTING, ROUND 1, MATCH 15: Ulrich Seidl (Dog Days) vs Benjamin Christensen (The Mysterious X) about 1 year ago
I really regret missing out on the voting in this match (and a bunch of earlier ones). I saw (and loved) Dog Days last night but didn’t get to Mysterious X before cutoff. Been falling further and further behind in my viewing. Thankfully there’s a brief reprieve so I can catch my breath and bone up on the coming bouts! I promised myself I would watch any films I’d missed before voting in round 2 matchups, so I’m as in-the-loop as can be. (Given my current record, a tall order.)
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DIRECTORS’ CUP 2011 VOTING, ROUND 1, MATCH 15: Ulrich Seidl (Dog Days) vs Benjamin Christensen (The Mysterious X) about 1 year ago
I didn’t participate in last year’s Cup so I don’t have the same frame of reference. Having familiarity with other works by Émond and Ramsay, later rounds could be interesting.
I would point out that the tighter adjusted sched these opening weeks might be another contributing factor to lowered participation. Since the first groups got shifted, the Cup started later but everything got more condensed. (i.e. We’ve gone match-a-day for nearly three weeks, with only a couple days off, as opposed to the anticipated 4 matches per week.) Despite my own best intentions to watch many and watch early, once I started to get behind, with no off-match days to catch up, turned into an unwieldy beast. ;) Coming back to the original schedule from here on will help out a lot with my own viewing and voting, and I imagine maybe some other people’s who didn’t crack the whip early. Just to say that I wouldn’t infer too too much about support for these directors’, when lower vote turnout might as likely be a confluence of external factors.
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Directors' Cup: General Announcements Thread about 1 year ago
Now I have to make sure I use this break to get ahead of the game, as opposed to taking a viewing break, or I’ll be back in my day-of double feature stress-athon again. :) Bring it.
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Director's Cup 2011: Round 1, Match 17: Nuri Bilge Ceylan (Clouds of May) vs Frans Zwartjes (Spare Bed-Room) about 1 year ago
Nuri Bilge Ceylan (Clouds of May) —1 vs. Frans Zwartjes (Spare Bed-Room) —0
I was somewhat detached at first in viewing Clouds of May, focusing probably too much on the meta and unsure what form the picture was ultimately taking narratively. Would this be the story of a family coming together in making a film; the story of the filming; the movie within a movie; was the movie a pretext for something else? This is one case where, in retrospect, I wish I had not read so much about the backstory of Clouds of May’s making beforehand. I went in with too much context and got way too analytical from the outset , nearly too objective to let the film’s heart reveal itself to me.
That heart crept in despite myself at a pretty specific moment, when Muzaffer screens older home video for his parents – in an attempt, probably, to persuade them to act in his latest project. The footage itself is quite breathtaking but their reactions to seeing themselves on screen are quietly moving. (No matter that his father has nodded off by the end.) It’s clear that they’ll participate, though his mother frequently (hilariously) entreats him to keeping looking for other actors.
At that point, Muzaffer returns to Istanbul for a time to prepare production and we follow his cast and family in the interim. The arc of the little Ali (played by the amazing Muhammad Zimbaoglu) is particularly brilliant.
What Ceylan accomplishes on a meager budget is remarkable. I’d already seen Three Monkeys but not had this visceral reaction (though I enjoyed it). Very eager to revisit it though. His work is so precise.
In any other context, I’d surely have voted for Spare Bed-Room. But Ceylan’s film completely won me over (and I was a very hardsell going in).
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surrealmoviez.info about 1 year ago
I’ve been loving SMz for a while. People should hop on board while they have a chance. ;)
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DIRECTORS’ CUP 2011 VOTING, ROUND 1, MATCH 18: Bill Forsyth (Gregory’s Girl) vs. Leos Carax (Mauvais sang) about 1 year ago
Bill Forsyth (Gregory’s Girl) —0 vs. Leos Carax (Mauvais Sang) —1
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DIRECTORS’ CUP 2011 VOTING, ROUND 3, MATCH 14: Marcel Carné (Port of Shadows) vs Fritz Lang (House By the River) 9 months ago
Marcel Carné (Port of Shadows) 1 vs. Fritz Lang (House By the River) 0
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DIRECTORS’ CUP 2011 VOTING, ROUND 3, MATCH 15: Ulrich Seidl (The Last Real Men) vs Bernard Émond (L’instant et la patience) 9 months ago
Ulrich Seidl (The Last Real Men) – 1 vs. Bernard Émond (L’instant et la patience) – 0
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DIRECTORS’ CUP 2011 VOTING, ROUND 3, MATCH 16: Benjamin Christensen (Häxan) vs Lynne Ramsay (Ratcatcher) 9 months ago
Benjamin Cristensen (Haxan) – 0 vs Lynne Ramsay (Ratcatcher) – 1
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DIRECTORS’ CUP 2011 VOTING, ROUND 3, MATCH 15: Ulrich Seidl (The Last Real Men) vs Bernard Émond (L’instant et la patience) 9 months ago
This was a great matchup. I’d strongly encourage people to watch both.
The Émond film is streaming only in French without English subs, isn’t it? Wasn’t a problem for me but may be an issue for some people.
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DIRECTORS’ CUP 2011 VOTING, ROUND 3, MATCH 17: Nuri Bilge Ceylan (Three Monkeys) vs Leos Carax (Boy Meets Girl) 9 months ago
Nuri Bilge Ceylan (Three Monkeys) – 0 vs. Leos Carax (Boy Meets Girl) – 1
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DIRECTORS’ CUP 2011 VOTING, ROUND 3, MATCH 18: Frans Zwartjes (Spectator) vs Bill Forsyth (Comfort & Joy) 9 months ago
Frans Zwartjes (Spectator) – 1 vs. Bill Forsyth (Comfort & Joy) – 0
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DIRECTORS’ CUP 2011 VOTING, ROUND 3, MATCH 19: Carol Reed (The Fallen Idol) vs Mark Rappaport (Local Colour) 9 months ago
Carol Reed (The Fallen Idol) – 1 vs. Mark Rappaport (Local Colour) – 0
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DIRECTORS’ CUP 2011 VOTING, ROUND 3, MATCH 20: Ousmane Sembene (Xala) vs Terence Davies (The House of Mirth) 9 months ago
Ousmane Sembene (Xala) – 1 vs. Terence Davies (The House of Mirth) – 0
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