Last (x) movies you saw (II)

I can't stop wishing Tsai would make something as big as Stray Dogs again

this seems unlikely in the near future, given how enthused he is about making works primarily for galleries atm. but said nothing that would explicitly rule a large project out; talked a great deal about the stray dogs exhibition he put on in taipei.

Starting to come around to the idea that Straw Dogs is his greatest work.

lol, Stray Dogs...

(Before I forget: re shit subtitles for Knife In The Water busted upthread, I saw it with good subs in a 70s theater; maybe that edition is still around somewhere)(no clue how true those 70s subtitles were to the spoken, but the whole thing was effective.)
Red Dust (Fleming, 1932): Harlow is a harlot on the lam but she ain't no sheep; Gable is useful to in several ways, while operating a rubber plantation way up the river from "Say-gon," as all the white people call it, with Gable and his fellow Men agreeing that you gotta watch the "coolies." Then Gene Raymond, an old friend of Gabe's, a little eager beaver who's talked his way into a job on Gabe's old home place and can't shut up, shows up with his blushing bride, omg Mary Astor, a classical poster child (Harlow calls her "the Duchess"), horny and picky and understandably flustered by this place and the whole situation---Hubby promptly catches jungle fever and there's no doctor and he won't stay the fuck in bed, he's gotta go work and prove himself.
All of these people have been programmed to prove themselves, and are becoming aware of it---except Jean Ho apparently found it a given long ago; in any case, she's practical about living each moment as enjoyably as possible, incl. call other people on BS when it gets too tiresome (although delivering sermons would be at least as tiresome).
Implications of the ending are satisfying enough to spin your own sequel.
6/10, docked a couple of points for pro forma racism, speaking of whoring.
Jean Harlow's husband, MGM executive Paul Bern, committed suicide midway through filming (some biographies suggest he was murdered and the studio covered it up) and MGM mogul Louis B. Mayer, fearing a scandal, appealed to Tallulah Bankhead to step into Harlow's role. She refused out of respect for Harlow and the blonde bombshell was soon back on the set, though considerably subdued. During her first day back at work, Fleming reportedly said to Mary Astor, "how are we going to get a sexy performance with that look in her eyes?" But Harlow proved herself the ultimate trooper...
Co-star Gene Raymond agreed it was a difficult picture to shoot and said, "...the whole thing was done at MGM. Stage 6 was now a jungle with a hut in it, and it stank to high heaven. The rain would seep in and all of a sudden you had mud. Then they put the hot lights on and it steamed up. So it was not a pleasant picture; it was hard for everybody, especially the crew." Regardless of the hardships, Red Dust was a hit and would later inspire a remake - Mogambo (1954) - directed by John Ford and with Gable repeating his original role opposite Ava Gardner (in the Harlow part) and Grace Kelly (in the Astor role).

A final bit of trivia: Jean Harlow would later marry Harold "Hal" Rosson, the cinematographer on Red Dust. Thanks, TCM!

her monologue on cheese makes it at least 8/10

don't know which subtitles I saw it with, but I loved Knife in the Water

xpost She's great---also from TCM: When Time Magazine covered the film, the reviewer wrote: "The best lines go to Harlow. She bathes hilariously in a rain barrel and reads Gable a bedtime story about a chipmunk and a rabbit. ("Say I wonder how this comes out?" her character wisecracks). Her effortless vulgarity, humor, and slovenliness make a noteworthy characterization, as good in the genre as the late Jeanne Eagels' Sadie Thompson." Gable: "People have to drink that!"

he's her straight man, and perfectly so (he's Astor's too, in a weirder, Astory-as-hell way).

I don't normally like or endorse movies about children, but COP CAR is a fun way to spend 85 minutes.

The Birthday Party (Friedkin, 1968)- baby's first Pinter; I've been wanting to dive in for like...Jesus, 20 years at this point, but never got around to picking up any of the readily available complete works, or tracking down any of the Losey movies, or etc. That's going to change; I've started tracking down anything else I can because this just ruined me for a day.

Lost in La Mancha (Fulton & Pepe, 2002)- another one from the "too depressed to watch for 10+ years" pile. Makes the business of 1st AD gripping and terrifying and for all its flaws (see below) at least makes me glad Adam Driver stepped in to fill the Johnny Depp part

*Towers Open Fire / The Cut Ups (Balch, 1963, 1966)- I'd seen these years ago at the Whitney's Brion Gysin exhibit; the former is a loose sort of Burroughs sci-fi routine in film form, and the latter a demonstration of the titular technique with Gysin, dreamachines, Ian Somerville, etc.

The Man Who Killed Don Quixote (Gilliam, 2018)- wanted to love it, I think I at least liked it; it's the best film he's made since Fear & Loathing, which is not a particularly impressive claim. Still has no idea what to do with women; kind of tiresomely self-aware re: Gilliam's own enfant terrible schtick without necessarily any real reflection on the subject; but at least it's often successfully funny

Secrets of Sex/Bizarre (Balch, 1970)- absolutely bugshit anthology film of shaggy dog stories loosely tied together by sex; weirdly prim, very British, shades of early Scientology in places, a Burroughsian twist in the last story, and one segment that will stick with me long after I've forgotten the rest of it (with the unforgettable line "Oh! My contact lens has dropped amongst your charms")

*The Long Goodbye (Altman, 1973)- perfect film will not be taking arguments at this time

Horror Hospital (Balch, 1973)- Michael Gough; weirdly anticipates the Rocky Horror Picture Show but drawing more on Hammer/Amicus productions of the very recent past for camp value instead of classic Hollywood. Fun, stupid.

The Octopus (Painlevé, 1927)
Hyas and Stenorhynchus (Painlevé, 1927)
Wise Girls (Hopper, 1929)
*Bright Eyes (Del Ruth & St. Clair, 1921)
*Thundering Fleas (McGowan, 1926)
The Best Man (Edwards, 1928)
Stickleback Eggs (Painlevé, 1925)
The Clairvoyant (Elvey, 1935)
Feel My Pulse (La Cava, 1928)
Bare Knees (Kenton, 1928)
The Texan (Cromwell, 1930)
The Border Legion (Brower & Knopf, 1930)
Us (Peele, 2019)
Shazam! (Sandberg, 2019)

*The Beaches of Agnès (2008, Varda) 9/10
Portrait of a Young Man in Three Movements (1931, Rodakiewicz) 6/10
Road to Life (1931, Ekk) 7/10
Panelstory or Birth of a Community (1981, Chytilova) 7/10
The Ghost Ship (1943, Robson) 7/10
*The Leopard Man (1943, Tourneur) 8/10
Juha (1999, Kaurismaki) 8/10
Something Different (1963, Chytilova) 8/10
*Nenette and Boni (1996, 7/10)
No Fear, No Die (1990, Denis) 9/10
Drifting Clouds (1996, Kaurismaki) 8/10
Tea and Sympathy (1956, Minnelli) 7/10
Take Care of Your Scarf, Tatiana (1994, Kaurismaki) 7/10
Claire Denis, The Vagabond (1996, Lifshitz) 8/10
U.S. Go Home (1994, Denis) 9/10
*Manila in the Claws of Light (1975, Brocka) 8/10

Spotlight (7.0)
Leaving Neverland (7.5)
The Grey Fox (8.0)
The Mean Season (5.5)
Greta (5.0)
Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps (7.0)
Catwalk (7.5)
The X Files (6.5)
On the Waterfront (10.0)
The Hummingbird Project (6.5)

Them Thar Hills (Rogers, 1934)
On Demande une Brute (Barrois, 1934)
The Masquerader (Chaplin, 1914)
Two-Gun Gussie (Goulding, 1918)
Along the Coast (Varda, 1958)
The Woman Disputed (King & Taylor, 1928)
The Garden of Eden (Milestone, 1928)
Ramona (Carewe, 1928)
Felix Wins Out (Messmer, 1923)
The Passing of the Third Floor Back (Viertel, 1935)

i lasted fifteen minutes of Her Smell, jesus fuck that's a dumb film
theater hopped to Red Joan and managed ten minutes of sexy communists then gave up
re-watched Hail Satan? and can confirm it's an A+ documentary.

Also jumped into the Criterion film class and watched Foreign Correspondent and Lydia; both superb.

Hook - **
Treasure Island (1934) - ****
Midnight Cowboy - ***
Star 80 - ****

The Big Heat (Lang, 1953)
N.U. (short - Antonioni, 1948)
The Short & Curlies (short - Leigh, 1987)
*Mishimi: A Life in Four Chapters (Schrader, 1985)
Yearbook (short - Britto, 2014)
Bugsy Malone (Parker, 1976)
Destroyer (Kusama, 2018)
The Silence (short - Asgari, Samadi, 2016)
Smithereens (Seidelman, 1982)
Kaili Blues (Bi Gan, 2015)
So Dark the Night (Lewis, 1946)
Pearls of the Deep (Menzel, Chytilová, Jireś, Němec, Schorm, 1966)

MUBI:

LA Plays Itself (Thom Andersen, 2004)
Alps (Lanthimos, 2011)
Microhabitat (Jeon Go-woon, 2018)

LA Plays Itself is kinda amazing - an essay film that sees into all that afflicts us - battles over urban space and transportation, de-industrialisation, climate crisis, Black Lives Matter (his discussion of Gerima's Bush Mama) with an added dose of the crankiness of a local, LA native. This is what Mark Cousins' Story of Film lacked: thee it was just film, the world in it was often missing. Microhabitat was a great little millenial film, a bunch of friends drifting apart from one another and what became of them. Was only half-watching the Lanthimos, just not much to grab me...

Recovering from surgery and not watching nearly as many movies as I had intended:

True Stories (Byrne, 1986)- loved it. I think it falls just barely on the side of genuine affection for its subject matter; not that cynicism about middle America is bad or something, just that it wouldn't be nearly as interesting. Especially loved the cast recordings of stuff like "Radio Head," "People Like Us" and "Papa Legba"- they're so perfectly suited to the performers I can't imagine being upset that they're not Talking Heads tracks.

Touch of Evil (Welles, 1958/1976)- to my eternal shame I still hadn't seen this. After some thought I decided to go with the '76 rediscovered "preview" cut on my first watch; after seeing it, I think I understand why some purists have problems with the Murch cut. I'm looking forward to diving into the different versions for a closer comparison soon, and because I make poor life decisions, sprang for a copy of the Masters of Cinema R2 disc, which is mostly identical to the US blu-ray (which I now need to sell...) with the exception of actually including the original 1.33:1 aspect ratio. (If anyone else has a multi-region player and is curious it's quite cheap on Amazon; I got mine for about $12).

Lupin III: The Castle of Cagliostro (Miyazaki, 1979)- Monkey Punch died this past week, and I was reminded that despite loving both Miyazaki and every other incarnation of Lupin I've seen I never got around to watching this. It's a sweet little caper movie that suffers a little from competing impulses (there are some surprisingly grisly deaths for a Miyazaki film, and conversely this is the cuddliest Lupin I've ever seen) but has some A+ slapstick and Miyazaki's trademark European settings, flying machines, etc.

*Duffy (Parrish, 1968)- Hardly a great film but some of Donald Cammell's nastiness survives; it looks great, Jameses Coburn, Fox and Mason are all in fine hammy form (Mason is obviously phoning it in but even then he's still fucking James Mason). Some great sets and wonderfully overbaked dialogue ("So long, you groovy old hooker"). Definitely not the worst thing Robert Parrish directed in the late 60s, at least

Mystery Street (Sturges, 1950) 7/10
1985 (Tan, 2018) 8/10
The Narrow Margin (Fleischer, 1952) 7/10
Let the Sunshine In (Denis, 2017) 5/10
Simon (Brickman, 1980) 6/10
Singin' in the Rain (Donen and Kelly, 1952) 9/10
Night Train to Munich (Reed, 1940) 8/10
Kubo and the Two Strings (Knight, 2016) 7/10
*Seems Like Old Times (Sandwich, 1980) 7/10
Can You Ever Forgive Me? (Heller, 2018) 7/10

i saw Seems Like Old Times in '80, didnt realize it was helmed by a sandwich. rye?

oh, legendary MTM/sitcom director Jay Sandrich, forgot that truly

old Cosby Show hand too

xp

Nah, its actually pretty broad.

But seriously--Sandrich. I hate autocorrect.

Especially loved the cast recordings of stuff like "Radio Head," "People Like Us" and "Papa Legba"- they're so perfectly suited to the performers I can't imagine being upset that they're not Talking Heads tracks.

they're in fact way better than the actual talking heads recordings!

oh, legendary MTM/sitcom director Jay Sandrich, forgot that truly

Didn't know that! Seems Like Old Times was apparently his only theatrical feature, which is kind of a shame--its one of the few post-Golden Age attempts at screwball that gets the genre mostly right.

High Life (Denis, 2019) 7/10
Sunset (Nemes, 2019) 5/10
Ash is Purest White (Jia, 2019) 6/10
The Package (Davis, 1989) 4/10
* Shampoo (Ashby, 1975) 7/10
* Laura (Preminger, 1944) 9/10

Stranger Than Paradise (Jarmusch, 1984) - 3/10
The Model Couple (Klein, 1977) - 7/10
Permanent Vacation (Jarmusch, 1980) - 9/10
No Home Movie (Akerman, 2015) - 10/10
Goodbye to Language (Godard, 2014) - 6/10
Hospital (Wiseman, 1970) - 9/10
*Persona (Bergman, 1966) - 10/10
Crash (Cronenberg, 1996) - 6/10
Primate (Wiseman, 1974) - 6/10
Sanjuro (Kurosawa, 1962) - 8/10
The Cranes Are Flying (Kalatozov, 1957) - 9/10
Monsieur Verdoux (Chaplin, 1947) - 7/10
British Sounds / See You at Mao (Godard & Roger, 1970) - 8/10
Le Samouraï (Melville, 1967) - 9/10
Bringing Up Baby (Hawks, 1938) - 9/10
A Matter of Life and Death (Powell & Pressburger, 1946) - 10/10
Lotte in Italia (Godard & Roger, 1971) - 4/10
Le Beau Serge (Chabrol, 1958) - 9/10
Crooklyn (Lee, 1994) - 9/10
Morocco (Von Sternberg, 1930) - 10/10

Crooklyn is an 8/10... the first hour is fantastic, a mosaic, but once Troy goes south it gets derailed and like so many Spike Lee movies ends up so frustratingly uneven and lopsided. the anamorphic distortion is a great idea - genuinely disorienting - but improperly applied & for too long. his best moments are always the pure cinema/magical realist bits at the end, and most of Crooklyn is just these bits strung together. hypnotic but he breaks the spell in the south. still often great despite itself and so much more fluid than any other movie of his I've seen.

Stranger Than Paradise (Jarmusch, 1984) - 3/10

why?

Recollections of the Yellow House (Monteiro)
The Pelvis of J.W. (Monteiro)
Come and Go (Monteiro)
Dans Paris (Honoré)
Love Songs (Honoré)
Sorry Angel (Honoré)
The Price of Fame (Beauvois)
Slack Bay (Dumont)
Far From Men (Oelhoffen)
Things To Come (Hansen-Løve)
Monsieur Hire (Leconte)
Intimate Strangers (Leconte)
Three Seats for the 26th (Demy)
Uranus (Berri)
Bungalow (Köhler)
In My Room (Köhler)*
Transit (Petzold)*
Wakolda (Puenzo)
The Clan (Trapero)*
El Angel (Ortega)
The Rose Seller (Gaviria)
Sumas y Restas (Gaviria)
The Hidden One (Gavaldón)
Raíces (Alazraki)
La Cucaracha (Rodriguez)
Roma (Cuarón)
Dumbo (Sharpsteen)
Spider-Man: Homecoming (Watts)
High Flying Bird (Soderbergh)
A Land Imagined (Hua)
The Asthenic Syndrome (Muratova)
The Return (Choi)*
Madalena (Dimopoulos)

Stranger Than Paradise (Jarmusch, 1984) - 3/10

why?

― . (Michael B)

two of the most uncool and annoying guys on earth hang out with a relatively boring woman. Permanent Vacation is better in every way: a compelling lead, better music, 'doing nothing' and making it interesting.

that is a helluva challop you got there

i aint even trying!

i did find it a snooze personally although i like the cast.

i don't think i like jarmusch v much in general tho

Young Mr. Jazz (Roach, 1919)
Dirty Work (French, 1933)
Another Wild Idea (Chase & Dunn, 1934)
Fresh Paint (Chase & Goulding, 1920)
Caught Plastered (Seiter, 1931)
Scram! (McCarey & French, 1932)
Should Married Men Go Home? (McCarey & Parrott, 1928)
Fatty's Reckless Flight (Arbuckle, 1915)
He Did and He Didn't (Arbuckle, 1916)
Avengers: Endgame (The Russo Brothers, 2019)

march + april in theaters

Greta (Jordan, 2018) - 3/10
The Image Book (Godard, 2018) - 10/10 -------- I saw this three times and would've gone again and again if it hadn't left after two weeks
Triple Frontier (Chandor, 2019) - 5/10
*Wild Strawberries (Bergman, 1957) - 9/10
Five Feet Apart (Baldoni, 2019) - 0/10
The Wedding Guest (Winterbottom, 2019) - 2/10
Us (Peele, 2019) - 6/10
Detour (Ulmer, 1945) - 6/10
The Beach Bum (Korine, 2019) - 9/10
The Aftermath (Kent, 2019) - 2/10
*Paris, Texas (Wenders, 1984) - 4/10
High Life (Denis, 2018) - 7/10
*Young Mr. Lincoln (Ford, 1939) - 10/10
Her Smell (Perry, 2018) - 2/10
Ash is Purest White (Jia, 2018) - 5/10
*The Magician (Bergman, 1958) - 9/10
Family (Steinel, 2018) - 9/10
Gilda (Vidor, 1952) - 7/10

*Daisies (1966, Chytilová) 8/10
Long Day's Journey Into Night (2018, Bi) 5/10
A Report on the Party and the Guests (1966, Nemec) 8/10
*Vagabond (1985, Varda) 9/10
*Lovers and Other Strangers (1970, Howard) 6/10
Blood Is Dry (1960, Yoshida) 7/10
Amazing Grace (1972/2018, Pollack, Elliott) 8/10
Isadora (1968, Reisz) 6/10
*35 Shots of Rum (2008, Denis) 9/10
*The Late Show (1977, Benton) 7/10
*Friday Night (2002, Denis) 8/10
A Bagful of Fleas (1962, Chytilová) 8/10
Ceiling (1961, Chytilová) 9/10
*Erin Brockovich (2000, Soderbergh) 7/10

really want to see a Chytilová film

Good luck if it's not Daisies! but I have no idea what could be on the web.

Criterion Channel has Daisies, Something Different (1963) and Pearls of the Deep (1966 anthology film, she directed one of the segments, "Automat Svět").

Daisies, Something Different/A Bagful of Fleas, Traps and Fruit of Paradise all available from Second Run DVD:

http://www.secondrundvd.com/index.html

The Image Book (Godard, 2018) - 10/10 -------- I saw this three times and would've gone again and again if it hadn't left after two weeks

I love this :) Really want to see it again.

Guillermin - Skyjacked - 1972 - 5/10
JH Lewis - My Name is Julia Ross - 1945 - 6/10
JH Lewis - So Dark the Night - 1946 - 6/10 -- amazingly shot for the time, but that script, oof
Quine - Pushover - 1954 - 8/10
Quine - Drive a Crooked Road - 1954 - 6/10
Hilton Edwards - Return to Glennascaul - 1953 - 3/10
Cohen - God Told Me To - 1976 - 4/10 -- my first cohen and i can't get past the b-movie aspects, e.g. the main character saying his internal narration out loud
Castle - 13 Ghosts - 1960 - 3/10

April:

The Earth Dies Screaming (Fisher, 1964) 7/10
The Panic in Needle Park (Schatzberg, 1971) 8/10
Lords of Chaos (Åkerlund, 2018) 5/10
Us (Peele, 2019) 8/10
Happy as Lazzaro (Rohrwacher, 2018) 8/10
Un Chant d'Amour (Genet, 1950) 8/10
The Revenge of Frankenstein (Fisher, 1958) 7/10
The Sisters Brothers (Audiard, 2018) 7/10
The Evil of Frankenstein (Francis, 1964) 6/10
Born Yesterday (Cukor, 1950) 7/10
Decision at Sundown (Boetticher, 1957)
Frankenstein Must be Destroyed (Fisher, 1969) 7/10
Crime and Punishment (Kaurismäki, 1983) 7/10
Trilogy of Terror (Curtis, 1975) 5/10
3:10 to Yuma (Dawes, 1957) 7/10
Greta (Jordan, 2018) 5/10
Pet Sematary (Kölsch and Widymer, 2019) 6/10
A Fistful of Dollars (Leone, 1964) 8/10
Calamari Union (Kaurismäki, 1985) 6/10
The Phantom of the Opera (Fisher, 1962) 6/10
Shazam! (Sandberg, 2019) 4/10
Avengers: Endgame (Russo Bros, 2019) 7/10

The Image Book (Godard, 2018) - 10/10 -------- I saw this three times and would've gone again and again if it hadn't left after two weeks

I love this :) Really want to see it again.

― Frederik B, Tuesday, April 30, 2019 6:42 AM (eight hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

After I saw it I got Histoire(s) du Cinema and this shorts collection (including Origins of the 21st Century) and realized how much of The Image Book is made up of material cherrypicked from both. HDC is so, so amazing.

Le Bonheur (Varda, 1965) 8/10
Private Life (Jenkins, 2018) 6/10
Juliet, Naked (Peretz, 2018) 7/10
So Dark The Night (Lewis, 1946) 5/10
Isn't It Romantic (Strauss-Schulson, 2019) 7/10
Dark Waters (De Toth, 1944) 8/10
An Evening With Beverley Luff Lin (Hosking, 2018) 3/10
Big Lebowski (Coen Bros, 1998) 9/10
The Wife (Runge, 2017) 6/10
Ralph Breaks the Internet (Johnston & Moor, 2018) 8/10
The Ghost & Mrs Muir (Mankiewicz, 1947) 9/10
Dogman (Garrone, 2018) 6/10
Under the Silver Lake (Mitchell, 2018) 7/10
Los Angeles Plays Itself (Anderson, 2003) 9/10
The Rider (Zhao, 2017) 7/10
Love, Simon (Berlanti, 2017) 7/10
The Beat That My Heart Skipped (Audiard, 2005) 8/10
Visages, Villages (Varda & JR, 2018) 8/10

Sinner's Holiday (Adophi, 1930) 7/10
Based on the 1929 production of a play, Penny Arcade: Jolson bought the rights and insisted that kiddos James Cagney and Joan Blondell, though complete unknowns in Hwood, be the leads. She's out of his league, but further inspires what one Cag biographer called "an immaculate vision of overgrown juvenile delinquency", albeit one who correctly perceives the limitations of carnival life in the Depression (his mother, played as immaculate battleaxe by Lucille La Verne, runs the concessions like nobody's business, but is the only one who doesn't know about her favorite kid's shady ways).
Yadda yadda, little popinjay C. suddenly collapses, blubbering into her apron. "Then you really was mixed up in that liquor racket," cpncludes Ma Einstein. "YES! YES!"
Now, there is an uppity ex-convict carnie, Angel, who's often like, "Hey---Handsone." And "Don't sweat it---Good Lookin'," to guys he really shouldn't messin' with--but his likely fate is further complicated by his relationship with Cagney's kid sister: "Aw I'm nerts about ya kid." It's even declared out loud that someday, some way, true love may hit the big time: a house on Coney Island! Way up from this burg.

That SUSPIRIA remake is on Amazon Prime now. It's 2 1/2 hours long; I lasted 45 minutes. There's nothing there.

I wish I saw that when it came out, I'm not into the original but this one looked interesting.... like I don't fuck with Blade Runner but 2049 was amazing imo