Goldfinger, in honor of Sir Sean Connery.
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House of Wax (1953)
Creepy Vincent Price classic has, of course, dated over the almost 70 years, but is still engrossing and macabre.
The Perfection (2018)
Inventive horror film about competitive concert cellists, initially set in Shanghai before moving to the US. This has some interesting twists as the good guys and the bad guys get mixed up. I definitely recommend it to fans of psychological horror.
Not a movie, so apologies.
The Queenâs Gambit: Just superb. Find it on Netflix.
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So good!
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YOJIMBO (1961)
SANJURO (1962)
Both on blu-ray disc
My husband complains that I never watch new movies any more, and he may be right. I may be entering an autumnal reflection phase of my lifeâI do not know: this is the first time I have been 60 years old.
Akira Kurosawa was a gateway auteur for me, as he is for many people. I am old enough to have gone to Film Forum to watch the U.S. premieres of uncut versions of SEVEN SAMURAI and HIGH AND LOW. I then went on to discover Kobayashi, Ichikawa, Ozu, Naruse, Mizoguchi, and especially, Imamura, and Kurosawa lost some lusterâespecially with regard to his portrayals of women. Mizoguch may not have been able to portray samurai, but he certainly showed a greater understanding of women and their position in Japanese society than Kurosawa.
But I still watched Kurosawa films from time to time. Their precision and mise-en-scene never failed to delight and entrance. The way he cuts on movement is thrilling, and his daring and successful use of wipesâeven in widescreenâis amazing.
On rewatching his films now, what strikes me is their homosocial natureâKurosawa is deeply fascinated by men and their behaviors. Though there is nothing explicitly gay about his work, and he elides any representation of same-sex desire/affection, his films are suffused with homosociality.
Of course, much more is written now about the homosocial nature of Japanese society before its encounter with the Westâespecially samurai culture. Kurosawa would have been aware of this history, and while not depicting openly it in his films, he reinscribes it in gazes, postures, placements, and faces. Fellini is hailed for his faces, but Kurosawa used faces just as expressivelyâat least the male face.
YOJIMBO resonated in the present momentâthe judgment that only by turning one side against the other and allowing the whole community to burn down can there be the hope of renewal.
I have always preferred SANJURO, and once again it shined. The continuity of action gives the film a propulsive motion much like Sanjuro himself, and Mifune is superb as Sanjuro, whether reclining or in motion. The alternation between reluctance to use action and the necessity to do so (often after others act foolishly) makes SANJURO and its complexity linger in my mind longer than YOJIMBO, which is structured as a more straight-forward action film.
But finding one Kurosawa film to be not as good as another is pointless. Most of his films achieve a level of aesthetic achievemnt that most films do not ever near.
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Watched with my kids for the first time:-
Close Encounters (1977)
and
The Great Escape (1963)
Both absolute classics!
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Planes trains and automobiles
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One of the top three funniest movies ever made!
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Sicilian Ghost Story (2017)
and
Hold The Dark (2018) - starring Jeffrey Wright, in a good performance
Both moody, well-shot thrillers but both left me with an empty feeling, and I wonât be watching them again.
I tried THE RHYTHM SECTION⌠but gave up after the first half hour.
What happened, EON? Visually ugly, narratively clichÊ-ridden, simplistic and badly edited, with the majority of shots just close-ups of a despondent Blake Lively, it came across as a run-of-the-mill tv show from the 90´s.
And what story is told? Another revenge trope. Isnât there anything else to tell? Especially if one tries to turn a female protagonist into a series-carrying hero.
I remember finding itâŚalrightâŚbut I canât remember anything other than thinking âBlake Lively, Jude Law and Sterling Brown are very good despite theâŚdialogueâŚâ
After watching many Nolan movies I was probably not that receptive for⌠lesser fare.
But comparing the Bond movies with this film I wonder what EON could not control on TRS - and why not.
I perhaps gave them the benefit of the doubt by allowing the novels writer to do the screenplay, despite knowing prowse and screenwriting are two VASTLY different crafts
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At least the first 30 minutes looked like they desperately punched up the material they could shoot. Not an ideal situation at all.
Yâdo the best with what youâre givenâŚ
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Lasting that long is quite an achievement.
In all seriousness, though, itâs really hard to see how those that have brought us the Bond movies could bring us something so terrible. Even on Bondâs worst day, heâs infinitely more watchable than this trainwreck of a film.
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Watched âBigâ with my 13-year old daughter. It has dated, and the plot is certainly a bit weird, but you canât help but love the main idea, and of course, Tom Hanksâ energy.
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OHMSS
Last time I saw this was five years ago, in my stubborn rewatch session (every Bond film in chronological sequence), and apparently I had been a bit Bonded-out back then because I remembered the first half as very slow. Today, not at all. Sure, the story begins to crackle only once Bond is at Pia Gloria. But the film moves very quickly even before that, being edited so tightly that it never bored me at all. And while I needed a half hour to get over Lazenby´s line readings at first, I also grew quite fond of his Bond portrayal afterwards. And this time, when Bond has escaped and is hiding out during that Christmas market, Barryâs (beautiful melody of) âDo you know how Christmas trees are grownâ, played as source music, is a terrifically creepy background for Bond´s growing unease.
Really, I loved this movie (once again). And while I do think that Lazenby was pretty good (the ending actually brought tears to my eyes) I am quite happy that he only did one, just because it makes OHMSS even more special, an outlier in the series, something that could only be done once.
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I agree with you about the scenes at the Christmas market - a wonderful sequence, and then it morphs into the snowy car chase, drive-by shooting, the ice racing and escape to the log cabin.
GIGI (1958) on Blu-ray disc
GIGI has fascinated/engaged me since I first saw a pan-and-scan version of it as a teenage cinephile. After these many years of engagement, I realize that it is a musical which often does not behave like one (at least as they were made during the Classical Hollywood period, especially by MGM). The theme and story are adult. There is no choreography save a brief twirl around Mamitaâs living room (staged by Minnelliâs MGM colleague Charles Walters). There are no set-piece musical numbers, and one songââShe Is Not Thinking of Meâ-- plays out in Gastonâs mind with Louis Jourdan occasionally mouthing the lyrics (in inserts shot byâagainâCharles Walters after Minnelli had moved on to THE RELUCTANT DEBUTANTE). Speaking of Charles Waltersâhe made an important contribution to the final picture in terms of shape and pacing, following Minnelliâs template, and, as he said, âsmoothing out the rough edges.â And following the template was no easy task since Walters had to match Minelliâs Paris footage with sets built on the Metro lot. Waltersâ ability to blend with Minnelliâs vision points to both his high degree of craftsmanship/talent, and why, as much as I love them, his films for me have a muted personal stamp.
Then there is the script by Alan Jay Lerner where scenes occur, and thenâbreaking all rules of storytellingâare recapped in the next scene for someone who was not present, e.g., a) Gigi rejecting Gastonâs offer, followed by b) Gaston telling his uncle Honore about what we just saw happen. GIGI is a film that both shows and tellsâand on more than one occasion.
On the scriptâs plus side, the songs are beautifully integrated in unusual ways for a film musical, e.g., utilizing direct audience address. MGMâs âgo bigâ/spectacle aesthetic is restrained here. GIGI is a chamber musical. âI Remember It Wellâ still amazes me (and I am unbothered by any visual mismatch between the terraceâs studio backdrop and the beach location shots. Music, lyrics, performance, and emotion carry the day).
This mix-and-match/rule-breaking/innovative filmmaking resulted in a glorious hodgepodge that is not only held together, but transformed by Minnelliâs mise-en-scene (others see an ungainly mess, but they are not writing this post). We are in Minnelliâs world of splendor, beauty, and (artistic) longing.
At the movieâs center are two charactersâGigi and Gastonâwho are constrainedâforced by society to play roles they do not wish to enact. The way they surmount their strictures resonated deeply for me as a gay teen and still doesâgrateful to be alive in a world of beauty and its possibilities, but knowing that same world would like to redirect me. Gigi and Gaston are Minnelli protagonists who succeed, akin to Tony Hunter and Gabrielle Gerard, and even Jonathan Shields. Gigi/Gaston conquer their environment, instead of being conquered by it (and the power their environment exerts is brilliantly/subtly conveyed by Minnelli through costume, set decoration, and their deployment in his mise-en-scene).
Rather than AN AMERICAN IN PARISâ finale handoff of Lise from one man to another (a film also written by Lerner, but without Coletteâs countervailing sensibility as part of the process), GIGI allows its female protagonist autonomy, e.g., the wonderful moment when Gigi tells Gaston she would rather be unhappy with him than without him. Then there is Gastonâs realization of the depth of his love, and that marriage is the only possible vehicle for itâthe role of roue is for Honore, but not Gaston.
GIGI is the only musical I know where the eleven oâclock number is a montage with only musical accompaniment. Gigi and Gastonâs brief, casual, but triumphant stroll at the end of the film is well earned, and we can join Honore in thanking heaven when little girls grow up to be independent women refusing to go along with convention (again, Colette must be acknowledged here. She supplied the novella the film was based onâone of the few she wrote with a positiveâeven sentimentalâending).
Other GIGI pleasures: all performances are fineâa touch over-the-top, but appropriate to their settingsâ sumptuousness; Conrad Salingerâs orchestrations are up to his usual high standard; costume and set decoration are superb (never has Minnelli red been so lavishly or pleasurably deployed); and Adrienne Fazanâs editing does wonders with the assorted footage she was given (she won her only Academy Award for her work here, having been nominated once before for AN AMERICAN IN PARIS. She received no nomination for her work on SINGINââ IN THE RAIN. Go figure).
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