TV/Movies Megathread

[LaCroix]

boyhood - pretty amazing

[CountDeMoney]

Deer cross the street a lot. The filmmakers saw a school bus coming when they were watching the deer by the road and they were able to warn the driver. It's a good thing filmmakers are being vigilant making sure there are no deer accidents. Can you imagine if they weren't there?!

I like this better than most asshole nature documentaries, where the camerapeople watch terrible things happen and we only don't hear the slapping sound of their masturbation due to post-production sound editing.

Marlon Perkins would insist the delicate ballet of nature must go on.

[celedhring]

Well, this is great. The Russian studio that owns the Soviet-made Tarkovsky films has posted them on youtube, for free.

http://www.openculture.com/2010/07/tarkovksy.html

Socialist film may not be very good, but at least it's available to the People.

N.b.: based on viewing the first forty-five minutes of Solaris.

Solaris is my favorite Tarkovsky film. He's very contemplative/poetic, though, so certainly not for everyone's taste. I personally believe he's an amazing filmmaker; one of cinema's great masters.

In general, state-mandated Soviet Realism made for some pretty uninteresting filmmaking, besides the novelty value. Heck, Stalin was known for executing/gulaging producers and directors of films he didn't like. Still, there's some amazing stuff out there, although most of the time authors got themselves in dire straits for not towing the party line (Eisenstein), or had to leave the SU entirely (Tarkovsky).

The best Socialist cinema was done outside the SU, imho, the Warsaw Pact countries enjoyed a little more leeway and there's some truly great stuff made in Hungary, Poland or Czechoslovakia. My favorite are the Socialist filmmakers in Latin America in the 60s-70s, though. Cuban films of that period, for example, are pretty amazing.

The thing about Socialist Cinema is that its theorists considered that a film had to be not only revolutionary in its content, but also in its form. So it was much more innovative than contemporary Western film.

[Ideologue]

I do like Battleship Potemkin.  That movie's cool as fuck.

And I am, one day, going to give Tarkovsky a real shot.  Probably not until I'm more up-to-date on my Eisenstein, though.   Sometimes I feel like I don't like contemplative/poetic unless it's Kubrick, and really it's only 2001 and Eyes Wide Shut where that description totally fits--though they are my favorites.  I can't really think of another director offhand who gets it, though.  (Jonathan Glazer, for example, sure ain't coming to mind--see below.   Refn rocked it in Drive, lost it in Only God Forgives.  Interestingly, Gareth Evans, of all people, does an okay job with it in The Raid 2, of all things, but he is straight-up ripping Kubrick off.   Maybe I'm forgetting somebody I really like.

***

Been a while since I updated, but here's stuff from the past week or so:

Locke (2014).   The best man in England has the worst day of his life: Locke is at once a filmmaking gimmick, a crass tearjerker, and one of the absolute best movies of 2014.  The responsible man

A+

The Glass Eye (1953).   A weirdly prescient attack on the media--and the masses that consume it--that cuts right to the bone, but never forgets to provide the chills and thrills that selfsame audience so desperately craves.  Blackmail by television

A

The Monolith Monsters (1957).   The writers' lack of access to an encyclopedia, and the abysmal stupidity that issues in its absence, subverts this sci-fi thriller severely.  And yet a no-nonsense running time, some surprisingly suspenseful direction, and a truly unique monster elevate it above the madding crowd.  Cardboard Science: Rock, roll

B+

Under the Skin (2014).   Mood and visuals attempt to replace imagination and narrative in this piece of throwback science fiction.  ("Throwback" is a double entendre, in case you weren't sure.)  Bangbus U.K. is different

C

Gamera vs. Zigra (1971).   The Showa Era proper draws to a close--and perhaps none too soon.  Somewhere between a bang and a whimper, there is Gamera vs. Zigra.  We've been eating Gamera, part VIII: "I am beautiful--and I should rule the seas!

C+

Gog (1954).   A bone-dry parade of fake-ass science with neither interest nor a terrible amount of incident--let alone what the marketing fraudulently claimed--but at least it hates foreigners.  Cardboard Science: Not what you'd describe as "a righteous hack"

D+

And not a one over 2k, unless you count the trivial sections of the Cardboard Science reviews, which I don't.

(And Locke?  Is really seriously really fucking great.  Grand Budapest Hotel just got some competition for no. 2 of the year, and even Grand Piano's getting pushed a little.)

[Ideologue]

You'll also notice I only gave ONE MOVIE a B+.

[Eddie Teach]

You gave half of them B+ or better though.

[Ideologue]

Then it's a perfectly balanced curve.

[CountDeMoney]

Grade inflation.  Just like your academic career.

[LaCroix]

Grade inflation.  Just like your academic career.

[Ideologue]

Grade inflation.  Just like your academic career.

Well, I could've ridden bubble-driven credit expansion, like your home ownership, but we can't all be born in exactly the right time, I guess.

[CountDeMoney]

Lulz, Nice try spider monkey, but 1997 was no bubble, and 17 years' of positive equity is the gift that keeps giving.

I'd say you would have a better shot taking a swipe at my education, but you went to law school.

[The Minsky Moment]

Socialist film may not be very good, but at least it's available to the People.

N.b.: based on viewing the first forty-five minutes of Solaris.

Try Andrei Rublev.  You might like it.

[Martinus]

So, I watched the Guardians of the Galaxy last weekend. Already saw some people reviewed it, so let me just say I disagree with The Brain that it is forgettable. I think it's the best movie Marvel made to date - very fresh and entertaining.

[The Brain]

So, I watched the Guardians of the Galaxy last weekend. Already saw some people reviewed it, so let me just say I disagree with The Brain that it is forgettable. I think it's the best movie Marvel made to date - very fresh and entertaining.

And you disagree by...?

[Savonarola]

I do like Battleship Potemkin.  That movie's cool as fuck.

And I am, one day, going to give Tarkovsky a real shot.  Probably not until I'm more up-to-date on my Eisenstein, though.   Sometimes I feel like I don't like contemplative/poetic unless it's Kubrick, and really it's only 2001 and Eyes Wide Shut where that description totally fits--though they are my favorites.  I can't really think of another director offhand who gets it, though.  (Jonathan Glazer, for example, sure ain't coming to mind--see below.   Refn rocked it in Drive, lost it in Only God Forgives.  Interestingly, Gareth Evans, of all people, does an okay job with it in The Raid 2, of all things, but he is straight-up ripping Kubrick off.   Maybe I'm forgetting somebody I really like.

Eisenstein's sound films are laughably bad.  You have been warned.

Eisenstein hogs all the silent era Soviet credit; but Pudovkin (Mother), Dovzhenko (Arsenal, Earth) and Dziga Vertov (Man with the Movie Camera) are all great.

For Tarkovsky films Ivan's Childhood is the best place to start; it's short, quick paced (by Tarkovsky standards) and is representative of his poetic style.  It does have some expressionist touches, which he won't use in later films.  Andrei Rublev is much longer, much slower and more sweeping.  I liked Solaris; but that's slower paced than Andrei Rublev.  I haven't seen any of his later films; they're supposed to have an even slower pace.