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In Reply to: How about a specialty forum for American or English language films? posted by Dalton on March 14, 2004 at 23:31:48:
All movies have a plot - some are un-intelligable. Something I learned long ago taking all those English Lit classes. Many people think that a piece of writing that is open to endless interpretations is actually a good piece of writing. Which it isn't.Many people who think they know something about film fall into this exact same trap. This is different from open endings, or characters that can be viewed in different ways.
Take 81/2. Here is a film director making a film about himself not being able to generate an idea of what film to make. He has been given the money to make a film but has no idea what to make.
Fellini's EGO is so gigantic that he thinks his "writer's Block" is actually important, relevant or interesting. It's mere self-indulgent stream of consciousness.
Trouble is of course it isn't REALLY stram of consciosness because this requires spontenaity and presumably Fellini had to cast actors, hire technicians write or have written a screenplay. So it isn't stream of consciousness.
Cinematography is average by today's standards, performances largely caricatures. None of them are relevant - the audience sure doesn't learn anything other than the guy is horny and has a creative block. A long philisophically trite speach to him toward the end is laughable philisophical psychobabble.
Thanks but if I want deep philisophical thought I'll read someone who is competant in the field. Aristotle, Thales, Socrates. Fellini wouldn't get out of a first year course.
Attack Hollywood? No thanks I will take the cotton candy for the brains Star Wars/Empire Strikes Back and laugh at the tongue in cheek sillyness and enjoy myself. Or a serious film about something of remote relevance like the War Zone.
And if I venture into philisophical film I'll watch Krysztof Kieslowski's Three Colours or Kirosawa's Shakespeare rippoffs like the Seven Samurai. At least if you're going to re-invent something it may as well be Shakespeare - Kirosawa actually makes moving heartfelt films...on that Hollywood did fail with Citizen Kane an emotionally void film with cinematography that is indeed impressive. Too bad it superceded the story and looks more like STUNT photography than actually serving the story. Oh but that's right it has a strike for having a story in the first place no?
Follow Ups:
Didn't you mean Kurosawa's "Throne of Blood"/And Citizen Kane is the greatest film ever made, IMHO. There's a hell of a lot more there than just great cinematography.
Seven Samurai is Lear well not quite. I'm not insulting Seven Samurai it's in my top 100 films...a masterful work. And I am behind on my Kurosowa...I still need to see his other works.Citizen Kane is a strong one. I'm surprised people found Rosebud the least bit surprising or climatic. This film perhaps Americans can appreciate more than me. Each person brings their own background into the film as a life baggage. I preferred Death of a Salesman as a pseudo tragedy to Citizen Kane. Unlike film schools which beat into the heads of students the surrounding and history of the time Kane was made - I try to look at the film for the film's merit alone. I don't care if it was "difficult" to make or Randolf Hurst was trying to get it stopped.
I have seen Kane 3 times and I liked it better on time 3. In the end it doesn't work for me at a gut level. Certainly it holds up well and is technically well made...just doesn't work for me to move beyond a high calibur 4 out of 5 to 5 out of 5 masterpiece. I have read a great deal of reasons why it's considered a great film...I have the conclusion that it's probably better suited to the American mind-set of the American Dream. I personally think it's handled better in Dustin Hoffman's Death of a Salesman(I never saw the original however). This was made for tv film based off of one of the great American Novels. It doesn't have the tragic fall of the great man of power. However, my problem with Kane and even Shakespeare is that I don't hold someone as being great because they have money or power. Willy Loman is an average Joe who bought into the propaganda of the American Dream and couldn't realize that there was anything else but the shirt and tie life of sales. His life amounted to nothing because of this false belief. SO it's a pseudo tragedy that he never figured it out and neither did Happy. Happy's brother Bif however did.
Again I understand why people like Kane...it just doesn't move me. and 75% of my rating of film has to have me engage with the story in the gut. No amount of technical prowess on any level can make up for it nor the history surrounding the film. Kane is in my second 100 list however so it is a very fine movie to me. Perhaps when I watch again in ten years my views might change.
A Clockwork Orange went from one of the worst pieces of garbage I had ever seen to my top 5 all time. Some films needed to grow on me after several views.
I recently watched a film called Talk to Her by Almodovar. I thoroughly was entertained moved and I can't seem to place a finger on why. The story is over the top bordering on ridiculous...black comedy of sorts I suppose but it's heart warming melodrama at the same time. It's probably the best film I saw of 2002...but I simply need to see it again. People don't even consider it to be one of his better films.
As for Wells I personally preferred the Third Man to Kane. If the Third Man could completely gut the scoring(one of the worst I have ever heard in any film) it would be one my true greats. As it is it's in my top 100.
There was plenty of excitement when it came out, but I think it decayed quickly too. Most people here seemed to agree it was the usual Almodovar, perhaps even his best work, but just not at the level of best films out there - I am talking best modern films, not even classic.I suspect in a year or so you too will forget about it.
I personally think there have been many better films in the recent years, some covered here extensively. For instance, Friday Night by Claire Denis is head and shoulders above Talk to Her, in my view.
I kinda share your views on Kane... when I stated last time I was not crazy about it, there was a small revolution here, and some people had to get into intensive care over such blasphemy. Some felt like the Social Security was taken away from them.
So I guess now you can say what you are saying - this page has been primed for it, and since you are posting down low there is little chance of mych hysteria.
"Ran" was his "King Lear".
yes and Throne of Blood was MacBeth...so Now you're going to make me dig into my Shakespeare to recall which the Seven Samurai was.I was not a huge fan of the tragedies however which is probably why I liked the Seven Samurai so much. It may be closer to the Henry IV Part 1 and 2 histories - that is if I can recall a Falstaff figure in the Seven Samurai...It's been a while since the Seven Samurai as well.
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As self indulgent as you are! Life would so MUCH easier....PS: The Three colours is a superficial desaster, safe the first one who is just simply a disaster.
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The way he fended off AuPh last time reminded me of Ney at Berezina.Masterful... brutal, but effective.
BTW - saw a great monumental painting a few days ago at Hermitage - the Berezina Crossing... marvelous!
Ditto for the Decalogue... quite shallow.
Yes, they just were " blender " ( dazzler ) I almost fell in for the first one ( Juliette? ) as for the music...Quelle merde et quel con je puis etre!
PS: Did you get my Email to Simon?
Yes, got the email.I think all Colors films were forgettable, except.... for that one scene where Julie Delphy rapes her husband... man, talk about raw sexuality!
I look ( only ) at these scene twice. Since then I feel with Hitch to be a voyeur. Is this bad?
***Take 81/2. Here is a film director making a film about himself not being able to generate an idea of what film to make. He has been given the money to make a film but has no idea what to make.Doesn't that sound like the famous Van Gohg self portrait - the one with the bandaged ear?
Just like most art...it's the story around the picture that generate interest. Is Jackson Pollock any good? I could vomit on canvas and create the abysmal dreck he made. But ooooh he was an alcoholic who did something different and died horribly. Van Gogh was a pscychotic.If you're weird enough like an Andy Warhol you get bonus marks - talent? That is totally beside the point.
This is little different that Spice Girls marketing...except this pretentious stuff is marketed to snobs.
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