TV/Movies Megathread

[Malthus]

Oh, and surely there must be some great uplifting movies in which lawyers build the world of tomorrow.

All of them. 

[Eddie Teach]

Oh, and surely there must be some great uplifting movies in which lawyers build the world of tomorrow.

Any movie where a lawyer is the hero, another lawyer is the villain. Usually BB.

[Malthus]

Oh, and surely there must be some great uplifting movies in which lawyers build the world of tomorrow.

Any movie where a lawyer is the hero, another lawyer is the villain. Usually BB.

Not necessarily ... In To Kill A Mockingbird, the villians were the plaintiffs and society generally. 

[Eddie Teach]

The District Attorney's always a good stand-in for the villainy of society in general. 

[Ideologue]

In Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, the villain is an underage Christina Ricci.

[Sheilbh]

In the Devil's Advocate the villain was the devil. Who just so happened to be a lawyer.

[CountDeMoney]

In the Devil's Advocate the villain was the devil. Who just so happened to be a lawyer.

Imagine that.

[CountDeMoney]

In Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, the villain is an underage Christina Ricci.

Imagine that.

[Ideologue]

The Man Who Laughs (1928).  I really liked the core story idea: Gwynplaine, a nobleman orphaned and disfigured as a child who now works in a freak show, is so fucked up from years spent subject to the ridicule of others that he now believes himself to be underserving of human affection, even from his blind friend Dea who cannot be offended by his grotesque permanent smile and cares deeply for him; but a chance encounter with an explorer in the further regions of experience, the Duchess Josiana (coincidentally the usurper of his rightful estate), leads him into a world of perverse sexual discovery that, he believes, can finally validate his existence and make him worthy of Dea's love.

The short version is I'd like to see Cronenberg's take.  Preferably with a part where Josiana cuts open her face to prove herself to him or something.  You know, something neat like that.

The long version is I don't understand anything else that happens in this movie, and even the core idea is mishandled and fails to resolve in what I consider an emotionally satisfying manner--he arrives at psychological Point Z, feeling as if he is now deserving of Dea, despite the very thing that's (however foolishly) kept him from her--being laughed at--happened roughly one hour before, from the mouth of a beautiful woman.

But that's not all.  Why do people like Gwynplaine's shows?  He's not funny.  He's not even that disfigured.  Did you see the sword swallower?  Now that's entertainment.  Why does the Queen insist upon restoring his inheritance?  No one wants it, not Josiana, not the other Lords, and not even Gwynplaine.  Why do the Lords berate their peer for "laughing" when he's not exactly the only guy in Parliament with a fucked up face, and in any event the act of laughing is very clearly distinct from his handicap?  How did Jeff Bridges identify Gwynplaine as a duke in the first place?  He's famous!  Therefore, if it were obvious that he is the rightful duke, why has no one else ever noticed?  Finally, why did this movie cost a million 1928 dollars when they don't even show the five legged cow?  What did they do, build a real castle?  It all combines into a real ball of annoyances that ultimately sink the film, despite its fine qualities, of which there are many.

I did like Conrad Veidt as the eponymous laughing man very much, acting with his eyes with that prosthetic in his mouth.  I liked Olga Baklanova as Josiana quite a bit too--I understand this was a bold performance at the time--and she is an effortlessly, stunningly sultry presence; she would have made a far more believable Whore of Babylon than Brigitte Helm ever did.  Mary Philbin as Dea is fine.  I found the scene, after they come to believe that Gwynplaine is dead, where they put on a mock production of Gwynplaine's play in order to fool her for just a little longer, just heartbreaking.  I liked the early use of very targeted sound.  I also enjoyed it when the dog murdered that guy; that was swell.  Finally, I overall enjoyed the filmmaking: for example, everything about Josiana's introduction involves killer shots (there's a reflection shot in her ornate bath, she dips her toe in, disrupting it before undressing, obscuring her scandalous nudity, and there is also the shot of her through a keyhole); and Josiana's first look at Gwynplaine is a really neat piece of editing.

But whether, as Sav says, I should see these like operas is I think missing the point.  Operas have stories too.  That's why the Ring Cycle loses me when they move from the mythic realm of gods and incest to East Bumfuck, Lotharingen.

Sorry, Clancharlie.  C

The Phantom of the Opera (1925).  Now this is more fucking like it.  Makeup work that is still effective today, a powerful, iconic villainous performance by Lon Chaney, excellent lighting, genuinely great set design (versus some fucking castle), an employment of film tinting that shifts with the geography that I initially thought would be distracting but which is rather sublime, and a mightily effective use of WTF REAL COLOR, as well as music (and one scream!).  Though the 1943 adaptation is not a bad movie per se, it's more like a weird romantic comedy where sometimes a terribly underused Claude Raines kills people, so what led Universal to put that version in their horror set instead of this is beyond me.  This is great.

Oh, it's not quite perfect.  The chandelier scene is too early, and over a little too quick, when that's built up to in the '43 version--it's still quite awesome enough, just not as much as when Claude Raines did it.

I also reckon that they found a very unsatisfying middle ground between giving no backstory to the Phantom, which would fittingly leave him in the shadows (and which, in any event, can be filled in with whatever our imaginations or prior knowledge can provide), and giving a full backstory, which would humanize and specify him, a path fraught with danger but successfully navigated by others.  As it stands, when he cries "Did you think you could outwit Erik?" it is unavoidably a little underwhelming.

Finally, I'm unsure of the character of Christine in this one as well--and unsure whether this is a flaw or a feature.  Am I supposed to despise her?  At first, I suspected that she thought she was making a literal deal with the literal Devil.  However, she meets no ill fate whatsoever in this movie--despite being a monstrous little accessory to murder, who only started caring about dozens of people being crushed beneath a chandelier when it turned out her co-conspirator and her putative Master would have a hard time with the oral sex.  Is that the point, or was it just that women weren't people yet in 1925, and so cannot be judged on those grounds?

But all in all, I'm relieved, because it turns out I don't dislike dramatic silent films.  I just don't like Germans--a far more defensible position.

A

[CountDeMoney]

We're going to change your account so you're not allowed to have access to the "Modify Post" button.  Fuck already.  If you review docs like you review your posts, you need to attend every training session available.

[Ideologue]

The major change was '44 to '43.  I got a year wrong.

[CountDeMoney]

I wouldn't have noticed at all, since I don't read your reviews if they're longer than three sentences.

[Ideologue]

You should.  They're endorsed by people who live in castles.

[The Brain]

I feel a little inspired by your reviews to watch some old movies. Not enough to actually do it so far, but still.

[Savonarola]

Almost certainly. Ide's reviews are always worth reading, but they're like a Legion of Decency for the lumpen proletariat (sadly the emphasis is often on 'lumpen').

I think that's one of the most apt descriptions I've ever read.