Let us discuss Olivier Assayas' epic film/mini-series about a famous Venezuelan with the nom de guerre CARLOS

Bring it in here, guys.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/26/magazine/26assayas-t.html?ref=global-home

this is nice

was kind of disappointed by j hoberman's piece, which seems to have been written on the basis of the cannes screening. like, it just is not true that carlos is always on screen. there are bits that are quite notable for his absence. and it's not really very much about carlos as media star; if anything it downplays that side. and it isn't just a wham-bam thriller. i can't remember 'che' so well because it was boring, but 'carlos' is just as 'serious' (just not boring).

― l'avventura: pet detective (history mayne), Sunday, September 26, 2010 11:38 AM (3 hours ago) Bookmark

kind of wish a.o. had printed more interview quotes, less career assessment

also wish some would translate assayas's books

I am confused about the availability of this. I think it's coming to IFC On Demand in October, though I get the impression that's the theatrical version. Meanwhile, I swear I saw an advert on the Sundance Channel saying the mini-series was coming in October.

my impression is that the on-demand version will be the full-length. otherwise why bother? don't know if there is any tv release planned in the UK.

i couldn't watch 5.5hrs in one sitting -- it's a three-part film, end of. and not a trilogy. but we're not in a cultural situation where cinemas show things in that way, because we're not in a cultural situation where people go to the cinema three nights in a row. am i wrong?

The ad on the back of Film Comment says 'In Theaters', and I assume you're right that they won't show all of it. Although I remember at the Glasgow UGC they showed all of Best In Youth, one part a night for several nights plus an omnibus version on the weekend.

I liked Scott's take on Demonlover.

OK, I found out what's going on. IFC is releasing the short version in theatres as well as putting it up On Demand, with the full length version in theatres at select engagements. The Sundance Channel is debuting the full miniseries the same month.

the UK poster says 'full versh in selected cinemas' so

what are the diff running times?

unless I'm mistaken, I think the theatrical is 140 minutes and the mini-series is 330.

the full theatrical is about 2.5 hours, the short version is 5.5

the middle section (which includes the OPEC sequence) is pretty much intact in the short version. i would say that about 3/4 of the third part are simply excised. some of the best stuff in the first version also goes.

the first and second films are plainly more exciting, and maybe in the third part the politics get a little complex (read up on french-syrian relations at the time of the lebanon war pre-show), but you know, find the time.

xpost

No way in hell is any version of Carlos playing here, so I gotta wait for video :/

some of the best stuff in the first version part also goes.

i meant

i watched the theatrical on friday (they sent me both, but the long one was such poor quality and so heavily watermarked the idea of looking at it for 5+ hrs was intolerable)

rapidshare is your friend

i kinda wish i'd seen the long one tho because a lot of it seems 'clipped'

except for, like u say, the opec sequence, which is amazing

ya i was wondering if it was up on the torrents or wtv but for some reason i figured it wouldnt be... damn

'miniseries' will def be released to NY theaters, at least for a few weeks

i was *just about* ok with the theatrical until it cuts to the berlin wall coming down, but it honestly felt like they didn't know what else to do so skipped almost to the end. it fucks everything up and makes the remaining 20min really drag. obviously a 5.5 hour film in three parts is not an easy sell, but that's what it is.

also, we get him seducing nora van waldstatten (sp),* and then her next scene is them divorcing 15 years later. craziness.

ya i was like what, jump ahead 15 years??

there's a scene where she's like "you just killed one of your best friends while our kid was in the next room" and i was like... i guess i missed that incredibly important moment?

it cuts from about 1978 -- carlos signing a deal with the syrians -- to 1989-90.

he sets up in hungary (because the east germans won't have him), and is meant to do all kinds of operations for the russians and romanians and syrians and libyans, but it all goes a bit 'boogie nights'

"you just killed one of your best friends" -- what is a bit curious about this is, well... im pretty sure it isn't in the long version either :/

but obviously the scene loses its heft a little, given that we've barely got to know her (spoiler: she is 'long-suffering')

looking forward to seeing this. i hope i get to see the full one at the movies.

s1ocki there's a good looking full rip on KG.

What jed said.

I haven't seen it though. Need to find the time! Assayas is all over the place, for me.

This starts on the Sundance Channel tonight.

This was quite good (the first part on Sundance)

Glenn Kenny interviews OA:

http://mubi.com/notebook/posts/2410

looking forward to this, although i don't find assayas a very exciting filmmaker.

but as a salsa dancer...

ay ay ay

it was fucking awesome.

the 3rd part wasnt as strong/credible as the the ones before him, but overall - an excellent work.

great (use of) soundtrack too,influenced by Scorsese (one out of many influnces from him):

loveless love - the feelies
dreams never end - new order
all night party - a certain ratio
sock it to me - john o´brien-docker
basta ya
yolanda - pablo milanes
paraguana
el sueno americano - la portuaria
feedback in viena
terebellum - fripp & eno
ahead - wire
Hi'lawe - tia carrere
Saa magni
contentement
forces at work - feelies
sonic reducer - dead boys
dot dash - wire
Zag Ihr Auch - Christian Gerd
drill - wire
the 15th - wire
sharing - satisfaction
pure - lightining seeds
jenra - Davy Graham
Duniya - Tata Dindin
Amir El-hosn - Hamza el-din
Mwashah - Hamza el-din
La pistole y el corazón - los Losbos
Saa Magni - Oumou Sangare

theatrical cut flies by, not least due to the omission of the entire 80s. thought it was great regardless

I'm gonna go see the 5-hour version in the theater, I think...

FREE SMALL POPCORN!

agree w/enrqq's take on the editing above, it just about works if you go in knowing its been cut from the cloth of the 5hr versh and there's going to be continuity issues

have no idea when/if I can fit long version into my next 2 weeks

I seem to remember seeing they were showing the longform vers at the gft but can't find anything about it on the net so maybe I made it up.

Or I'm a maladroit googler.

In London all I've found up to now is that Greenwich Picture house are playing the 5hr version tomorrow.

Riverside are playing the no cut versh on 12th December.

Lumiere don't seem to want to know?

Curzon Cinemas will be welcoming director Olivier Assayas for a Q&A after a very special screening of the full length version of Carlos. At 5 hours 34 mins in length it will be screened in 3 parts, each in its entirety, with an interval. Sunday 24th October 1.00pm, Curzon Mayfair.

^yeah I saw that, and it is tempting, but I've been put off slightly by all the comments saying that yes it's very good, but only 'very good'. Feeling like I can wait for the DVD which better have the 5hr version.

yeah man i hate very good films.

it'd be cool to see the q&a -- i say go. the dvd's out in like a week, i think, but if you have the option to see it on the big screen, why the eff not?

My very demanding degree, possibly! If I can get enough work done today and afterwards...and it better not be sold out..

ha, sorry, being a bit judgemental based on my ridiculous amount of recreation time.

interesting it's not at the lumiere. assayas makes a big thing of dissing the french cultural establishment -- might be related.

the response hasn't been quite ecstatic -- it's not a film you come out of with a spring in your step. coz it's five fuckin' hours long, and there's no heroic ending. it's quite difficult to review too, being so long and full of... stuff. the range of brilliant small roles is one thing it's hard to convey.

and also it kind of goes against what people want to hear. i remember assayas saying that cahiers had been down on 'the lives of others' because it said that maybe life under communism kind of sucked. similarly, 'carlos' isn't really much to do with the 'terrorist-as-superstar' thing, and it even goes so far as to say that not everyone on the radical left has their heart in the right place.

but remember that reviewers *did* get ecstatic about fuckin' 'the white ribbon' and 'un prophete'. this is a much more intelligent, exciting, vital film; but imo assayas is almost the only director in europe worth bothering with. might even see it a fourth time myself tomorrow.

haha you're saying people don't think it's pro-carlos enough?!

dunno about 5 1/2 hours of this in one go

haved watched 5 episodes of sopranos over the course of a day before but not in consecutive sittings

d

and yeah all this shuttling around between bigmen who are either long gone or just recently gone... or hanging on. so strange.

(spoilers) i didn't quite get one element of the OPEC hit -- he was there to kill the oil ministers of saudi arabia and iran, as a favor to (then-new) saddam, who wants oil prices to skyrocket, so he can afford to crush the kurds. is that right? i also thought i heard carlos' superior say it was to prep for saddam's invasion of iran? is that right? what i don't know is what relationship iraq had to pre-revolutionary iran. i guess i could look it up.

he was there to kill the oil ministers of saudi arabia and iran, as a favor to (then-new) saddam, who wants oil prices to skyrocket, so he can afford to crush the kurds. is that right?

basically yes. they're refusing to put the price up any higher. i did not hear anything about an invasion of iran though.

ok, misheard then.

that immediately struck me as a stupid plan, even if it did work. so what if you kill the countries' representatives, that doesn't change those nations interests at all! it's not the just the "soldiers" that were totally un-self-reflective, everyone in the game seemed to have a really outsized idea of what terrorism could accomplish. one of the subexts, i think, is that through the 80s this idea started to shift, demonstrated by the hungarians and even the stasi; terrorism is pointless and creepy at best.

im told that the stasi/east german regime regarded the russians as backsliders, that they represented the vanguard. so they would not have been interested in adventurers like carlos. i think the hungarians just wanted a quiet life.

that's a good point about the vienna mission. not sure how it was supposed to end.

i had some trouble keeping track of all the knockout black-haired women, for a while.

this was so noticeable it had to be deliberate....unless Assayas has a particular thing for gorgeous dark-haired women, which makes him normal.

^^lol The real Carlos, Maggie & their daughter:

http://i816.photobucket.com/albums/zz85/cittadinoamericano/My%20Photos/carlos_ilich_9b_kopp.jpg

also liked the black comedy of all these contending leftist groups and states trying to figure out how to knock off sadat, and then someone totally unrelated does it. yoink!

imo that's the key thing about the film: the comrades have a belief in historical inevitability, carlos never loses it. he's completely oblivious to the chaotic truth. he's miffed about missing the sadat hit but doesn't really reflect on things.

most on_the_nose moment: his weedy german bro sez: "the war is over. we lost." carlos just... 'converts' to 'islam'

the trajectory of all those freaky germans is pretty wild; i don't know that stuff all that well. prison and death for a lot of them, and then, joschka fischer...

there was a long TNR article about fischer and his old revolutionbros a year or two ago

A shame that Lady Thatcher and the late Reagan can't watch this film and realize the pathetic state of international leftist terrorism in the seventies.

lol i think they knew

besides, they were still 'effective' at killing people

Ronnie and Maggie?

:P

Netflix sent its four-disc edition today.

I'm tempted to go as OPEC mission Carlos for halloween. All I'm missing is the beret and the shoes.

great movie!

good thread!

Almost tempted to flip this. In part due to the excitement here, we started this, but haven't felt compelled to move beyond part one. Well made, well acted, but felt a bit "and then this happened, and then this happened..." boilerplate to me.

it gets somewhat looser

it sustains itself very well. looks absolutely genius next to Mesrine. anyway, I got the blu-ray for christmas so I'm excited to see it in one sitting and in good quality.

Finally got hold of the 3-DVD set and watched it over Xmas. Its fantastic. Not only does he tell, but he SHOWS -- especially in that last hour where he becomes a ghost of the 'radical' left's past.

And (maybe bcz I watched it at roughtly the same time) it sorta works well w/Marker's Grin Without a Cat, as a history of the left in all its my shades of black.

Carlos was given another life sentence a few weeks ago - here is a report

the ideal rainy Sunday afternoon movie

Otm

that is a long, hard rain

just watched the first ep(?) last night, really good, pumped to watch the rest tonight/tomorrow

wish I had time for a full viewing

i think about this movie a lot!
does assayas have a new one coming out?

Tomorrow it'll be two years since I saw it in the theater.

does assayas have a new one coming out?

His new one (Après mai / Something in the Air) just came out a month or so ago in France - I'm not sure where else it has been picked up for distribution...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Eeuku4vzPkg

It's played festivals in the US, and I think it has distribution for 2013. Annoying when Americans people put in their EOY lists for 2012.

après mai is pretty good... it didn't really land with me so much... but it's the kind of movie i could see revisiting and really digging

Ideal for long hot long weekends.

Don't read if you haven't seen this.

At the end, when Carlos gets extradited back to France on the plane, is the French official who takes him back the same one who survived the shooting 15 years earlier?

Anyone know this well enough to tell me where in the film "Dot Dash" is played? (What's happening or, even better, how far into it time-wise, approximately.) There's no clip online, and the Tunefind listing for Carlos is empty.

Isn't it during one of the plane sequences?

Watched the shorter version last year. Maybe one day will get around to the longer version.

Alfred: meaning a hijack scene? I'm trying to dodge watching the whole film again for a two-minute sequence. (Not that it's not great, but I just watched it again two months ago.)

I will keep an ear open, clemenza, but don't hold your breath.

Thanks.

Very first tune playing when he arrives in Beirut is "Loveless Love" by The Feelies, but you probably already knew that.

I didn't. All I remember are "Dot Dash," "Dreams Never End, "Sonic Reducer," and "Ahead"--all brilliant.

Alfred: meaning a hijack scene?

I think so? I saw it a couple years ago again but my memory's hazy too.

"Dot Dash" shows up in part 3, 21 minutes in. Funny, rewatching this has been on my mind lately, good way to spend a day in quarantine

Thanks! You just saved me from killing yet another movie by watching it too many times too soon.

What is the optimal rewatching interval?

Like to watch a movie a second or even third time right ways to see what I missed the first time, but after that dunno

It's the "after that" I have a problem with. Have killed many of my '70s favourites by this point--the two Godfathers, Taxi Driver, Nashville, others.

Yeah I hate burning out on stuff like that, I've been wary of doing it with Carlos - I think I've watched it twice all the way through, I've been waiting until its felt like long enough that I can really get excited about seeing it again. Now feels like as good a time as ever.

This post upthread has a list of tunes (but not the relates scenes) from the soundtrack: Let us discuss Olivier Assayas' epic film/mini-series about a famous Venezuelan with the nom de guerre CARLOS

Ended up watching the whole thing yet again. I went in thinking that "Dot Dash" was the musical highlight, but I don't think so--not that or "Ahead" or "Dreams Never End," great as they are. It's "Sonic Reducer" during the capture of Nada.

Part 3 is great in the way that Carlos and Johannes have been reduced to such marginal, anachronistic ghosts, even though it takes them a while to realize the world has passed them by.

Forgot about “Sonic Reducer” being in there.