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Posts From the Internet Film Discussion Group, a_film_by
This group is dedicated to discussing film as art
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1301
From: programming
Date: Tue Aug 19, 2003 4:34pm
Subject: Re: Clarence Brown
> I've seen THE LAST OF THE MOHICANS, which is amazingly good. I've
> always given the credit for it to Tourneur, who I believe is the
> credited director; but apparently Brown also directed some of the film
> when Tourneur was ill. - Dan
>
>
> Yes, I think it was primarily a Tourneur with Brown assisting. If memory
> serves, Brown was an assistant for Tourneur in the late teens and he had more
> direct involvement in Mohicans, the last Tourneur he worked on before becoming
> a director himself.
>
> Patrick F.
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
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1302
From: Dan Sallitt
Date: Tue Aug 19, 2003 4:41pm
Subject: Re: Re: OASIS
> For me, OASIS was a very heartfelt movie about the feelings of outcasts
> seldom seen on the scene. The 'magical" scenes were perfect.
There was something uncanny and very powerful about the way the lead
actress slipped out of her disability mode in the fantasy scenes. Lee
staged these scenes so that the transformation was inconspicuous - each
time it happened, my eye was directed elsewhere when the transformation
occurred. - Dan
1303
From: Elizabeth Anne Nolan
Date: Tue Aug 19, 2003 7:04pm
Subject: Re: OASIS
--- In a_film_by@yahoogroups.com, Dan Sallitt wrote:
>uncanny and very powerful about the way the lead
> actress slipped out of her disability mode in the fantasy scenes. Lee
> staged these scenes so that the transformation was inconspicuous - each
> time it happened, my eye was directed elsewhere when the transformation
> occurred. - Dan
Unfortunately, OASIS is a good art film, but even a 'sophisticated' audience
like that at the PS INTERNATIONAL FF had its share of early walk-outs, same
as for THE SON.
1304
From: hotlove666
Date: Tue Aug 19, 2003 8:07pm
Subject: Realism
I'm way behind on replying to all the interesting posts. Let me
just make one point to Yoel. Quite apart from the philosophical
issue of what we know about the world, there's a confusion of
two critical terms in your post: "realism" and "mimesis" or
"imitation." Long before the advent of realistic painting and
literature, mimesis was the term used to define, praise or villify
art. Aristotle uses it in his Poetics when he defines tragedy as
the imitation of an action; Plato uses it in The Republic when he
condemns art as imitation of the world of the senses, a mere
copy of a copy (since the world was supposed to be a copy of
the world of Ideas).
Neither was talking about realistic art - Oedipux Rex is certainly
not that. Neither is the story of Abraham and Isaac or the episode
from The Odyssey that Auerbach uses at the beginning of his
book Mimesis to distinguish two different styles of imitation. The
ideal of mimesis did eventually turn into the idea of realism or
naturalism, which happened at a defined point in time and
produced worlds that everyone calls realistic with no problems,
even though we know that monocular perspective in painting, for
example, is a convention.
The next step in this very old and oft-told history is what Yoel
cites Brakhage and Mondrian for - imitation of the artist's
emotions, or more generally, inner world. You can date the
"revolt against mimesis" from all sorts of things. For me an
obvious key moment is Wordsworth's Intimations Ode, where a
child is born or reborn into the natural world, taken in hand by the
"kindly foster nurse," Nature, who does all she can to make him
feel at home in her realm; and then gradually, through imitating
what he sees and hears - including behavior - "as if all his
vocation/Were endless imitation," he becomes trapped in a
lower existence than the one he came from, and the frost lies
over him "deep almost as life'"- buried alive, in other words.
This blatantly Gnostic view of human life includes an even more
radical attack on mimesis than The Republic, where the Myth of
the Cave is already an import from Eastern Gnosticism before
Plato, and it leads in Wordsworth to the writing of lyric poetry
which can all be summed up by the title of his magnum opus,
The Prelude, a 14-book Miltonic epic whose subtitle designates
it as a "History of the Poet's Mind." (One 18th Century
predecessor of Wordsworth's reinvention of the lyric was the
essay poem, which imitates thought, or the verse epistle, which
does the same by imitating the natural medium of thought, the
voice, according to Lucan's much-quoted formula that the
alphabet "paints the voice.") That is the beginning of a new
mimesis (which Auerbach certainly takes into account: his last
chapter is about a free-association passage from The Waves),
but calling it "realism" is using that term in a way that most
people wouldn't understand.
A lot of the arguments I've been reading which presume that no
one knows what realism means, and that there are many
definitions of it, are conflating realism and mimesis. Realism is
a historically defined style of literature and painting that carries
over into photography and cinema - Baziin even claimed that
cinema is "ontologically realistic," a debatable but certainly
comprhensible statement. Mimesis is a much more flexible term
with a much longer history that certainly includes Yoel's
examples from Brakhage and Mondrian. "Abstract
expressionism," going in the door, was conceived as a form of
inner mimesis, according to my skimpy knowledge of the
subject. But let's keep "realism" as "the representation in art of
objects as they actually are, without idealization or presentation
in abstract form." That definition is big enough to include many
sub-realisms--neo-, poetic, social and so on - without swelling it
into a synonym for the much ampler idea of mimesis.
Re: The Wrong Man - Hitchcock sure thought he was doing
realism. He even regretted when he spoke to Truffaut that he had
strayed in any way from the precise facts. Of course, what he did
was more complex than that, and that certainly goes for the
subway. That complexity can work, or not work. In Cold Blood,
which literally "returned to the scene of the crime" to reenact the
Cutter murders, was trying hard, too, but Brooks' polemic and
corny writing ideas (all those pie-in-theface associative cuts)
introduced abstraction at a level that seems ludicrous when we
see the film today. In the Hitchcock, the stylization and dramatic
shaping of the documentary material worked.
1305
From: Fred Camper
Date: Tue Aug 19, 2003 8:17pm
Subject: Re: Schickel, & Cukor
Well, I have a bad habit of no longer taking someone seriously at all
when they do something *so* ridiculous....
So I think it was more than thirty years ago that I gave up on Schickel
after watching his "Men Who Made the Movies" on Cukor. The thing was
predictably uninteresting until the rather surprising ending. For the
climax, the narrator (Schickel?) said something like, "Now let's see a
scene that sums up all of Cukor's artistry" -- I really don't remember
exactly what he said.
What then followed was "Born in a Trunk" from "A Star is Born."
There are a couple of little bitty problems with this. One, "Born in a
Trunk" is neither very Cukorian nor very good, even though "A Star is
Born" is great. Two, he didn't even direct this sequence. And three, he
protested its inclusion in his film at the time and in later interviews.
All of these factors together make the ending such a mistake as to be
beyond the pale.
I wonder if I have all my own facts right here; it's been a long time
since I "knew" about this. Also, if anyone has seen the Cukor segment
recently, I'd be interested to hear if it remains unchanged.
- Fred
1306
From: hotlove666
Date: Tue Aug 19, 2003 8:46pm
Subject: Cukor
It's been a while, so I can't say. I asked Ron Haber why in hell he
didn't take the Trunk number out when he restored Star, and he
said he didn't want to be lynched. I still think it would be a better
movie without it.
1307
From: vincent lobrutto
Date: Tue Aug 19, 2003 10:04pm
Subject: Re: Schickle
Fred,
I completely agree with you about Schickle. Have you read his book on Griffith? It really is poor scholarship. The Clint Eastwood book was an authorized attempt to maintain Clint's myths which Pat McGilligan completely demolished in his book.
Sorry I don't know the answer about The Men Who Made the Movies - I watched them all when they originally aired. I remember liking the Hitchcock and Vidor shows mainly because of their interviews - the narration was overbearing. I do know that they are out in book form and that some of them were revised and shown on I believe TCM.
He keeps at it but there is that credibility problem...
Vinny LoBrutto
---------------------------------
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! SiteBuilder - Free, easy-to-use web site design software
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
1308
From:
Date: Tue Aug 19, 2003 7:06pm
Subject: Re: Re: Schickle
In a message dated 8/19/03 6:06:48 PM, vincentlobrutto@y... writes:
>I completely agree with you about Schickle. Have you read his book on
Griffith?
>It really is poor scholarship. The Clint Eastwood book was an authorized
>attempt to maintain Clint's myths which Pat McGilligan completely demolished
>in his book.
I'm with both of you guys as far as Schickel goes. I don't want to spread
unsubstantiated rumors, but I think his credibility problems go beyond the bios:
I remember reading somewhere that he ran into big trouble at Time when he ran
a review of a film he, apparently, hadn't seen (?!?) And Adrian's right.
Despite his long-term support of Kubrick, I think he's one of the blandest
thinkers on Kubrick out there.
I like some of the "Men Who Made the Movies" shows for the interviews, but
Vinny's completely right in terms of the overbearing narration. The Vidor one
is fascinating while Vidor is talking, but then we get Sydney Pollack on the
soundtrack (on the revised TCM episodes)...
Now Pat McGilligan is a great scholar/biographer. As Vinny knows, I'm a big
fan of much of his work. I wonder if he has Internet access and/or is aware
of our group?
Peter
http://hometown.aol.com/ptonguette/index.html
1309
From:
Date: Tue Aug 19, 2003 7:46pm
Subject: Schickel
As the world's most contrary cuss, it is now my duty to say a few words in
praise of Richard Schickel!
At a time when the whole American media, led by that *&$%@*$#%
anti-intellectual mess Pauline Kael, was blasting auteurism to hell, Schickel stood up and
was counted. His TV series on The Men Who Made the Movies brought great classic
directors into the homes and minds of millions of Americans for the first
time. One could turn on one's TV screen, and see our great artists like Vidor and
Walsh.
As far as I can tell, Schickel was one of the few establishment figures in
the US to support great directors and auteurism. (He was critic for Life
magazine.) He didn't have to do this. Everyone else who played ball with Pauline
Kael and the Paulettes went on to wealth and power.
I'm also looking at the old paperback copy of Sarris' "Confessionists of a
Cultist" that I've treasured for so many years. On the back are quotes from
Schickel (Sarris "is undoubtedly one of our best and most serious critics") and
Cassavetes (Sarris "helps turn the film world into an art rather than an
industry".)
Doesn't Schickel belong with the Cassavetes of the world, rather than the
Kaels?
This does not mean Schickel should be given a free pass. Any errors or
misjudgments in his work should be challenged and corrected. But we should also
acknowledge his genuine achievements as a public educator.
Mike Grost
1310
From: Damien Bona
Date: Wed Aug 20, 2003 2:55am
Subject: Re: Schickle
--- In a_film_by@yahoogroups.com, ptonguette@a... wrote:
>
> Now Pat McGilligan is a great scholar/biographer. As Vinny knows,
I'm a big
> fan of much of his work. I wonder if he has Internet access and/or
is aware
> of our group?
>
Tender Comrades, which Pat McGilligan edited with Paul Buhle, is one
of my favorite books ever, a collection of interviews with Hollywood
blacklistees. The book is heartbreaking, inspirational and gallows-
funny, and it also reminds you that even though Stalin betrayed the
idealism of the Left, that idealism is still something to be
cherished. The blacklisted artists -- and the teachers, trade
unionists, writers, etc. -- who didn't give friendly evidence will
always remain at the pantheon of my personal heroes.
As an indication of how essential a film/social history scholar
McGilligan is, the book Radical Hollywood, which Paul Buhle wrote not
with McGilligan but Dave Wagner, borders on the embarrassing with its
hypothesis that any film on which a lefty was inolved -- even the
lovably absurd and inept The Kid From Cleveland -- is a major work
precisely because lefties were involved. McGilligan is much more
objective than that (although, of course, a terrible film in which
lefties were involved is still inherently better than a terrible film
in which right-wingers were involved).
1311
From: hotlove666
Date: Wed Aug 20, 2003 3:53am
Subject: Schickel
Hear, hear Mike. That's how I remember The Men Who Made the Movies -
turning on PBS once a week and seeing choices I cherished put out
there for a general public. I met him once recently - he looks like
John Wayne these days, and is about as prickly. But when I
interviewed him about Hawks for a couple of Cahiers DVDs, he saved
the day for us with really thoughtful observations on the films and
recollections of Hawks - not anecdotes, but apercus that surprised me
and illuminated one of favorite "directorial personalities" -
everything he said came from obvious affection. We talked on the
phone a bit, and in comparing notes on critics and directors I found
myself largely in agreement with him. At one point, going down the
list, I mentioned Budd Boetticher, and he said quickly and
firmly: "Budd Boetticher is a great man" - putting him a different
category than the others we had discussed. I liked him, and urged him
to speak to Joe Hyams before undertaking Red One (they are old
friends) so as not to run into any landmines, but apparently Joe
remained as mute with him as he has with me about the problems he
encountered.
As far as (maybe - source??) reviewing a movie he hadn't seen, I can
promise you he isn't the only widely respected critic I know of who
has done that. Pascal Bonitzer actually made a film called Rien sur
Robert about a French critic who has reviewed a film about ex-
Yugoslavia without seeing it and has been found out. Everyone knows,
and it follows him around like an albatross during the whole film -
an added running gag being that no one seems to know whether it was a
Croatian film or a Serbian film.
1312
From: Peter Tonguette
Date: Wed Aug 20, 2003 4:08am
Subject: Re: Schickel
Well, Mike and Bill do make a case for the "Men Who Made..."
docs that I find compelling enough. In the case of almost every
one of the directors profiled, I can think of better, more thorough,
more interesting docs... but I can agree that Schickel's are good
introductions for a mass audience (the Cukor goof aside.)
I probably shouldn't have mentioned the item about Schickel
reviewing a film he hadn't seen, as I honestly can't find where I
read about it; it was second-hand to begin with, I know. As I say,
excessive piling-on on my part.
Peter
1313
From: hotlove666
Date: Wed Aug 20, 2003 4:19am
Subject: Realism erratum
I think the last chapter of Mimesis is about Mrs. Dalloway, not The
Waves, and the technique discussed is "stream of consciousness,"
not "free association"! (My lunch hour was running out and I was
hungry...)
Since I haven't beaten the group over the head with the Cahiers
lately, let me just remind everyone that when it comes to skepticism
about realism, the 69-72 Cahiers led the charge. I think Serge D.
says in my interview posted by Steve Erickson that realism (or
naturalism) was the enemy. One way of tearing it down was to show
that it was a set of conventions pregnant with all sorts of bushwah
ideologemes (true, actually), and an alibi for peddling pernicious
ideas under the guise of "just the facts, ma'am" (the Barthes
argument, also true). Oudart analyzed Las meninas to show the class
structures underlying its eyelines, and even did a transformational
analysis of how it was generated by varying the positions of the
stock elements in medieval paintings of the artist presenting s
painting to the Virgin, to show how a feudal representatational
system became a bourgeois one. (This is all translated in the BFI
collection for that period.) They psychoanalyzed Bazin's obsession
with reality to show its unconscious underpinnings (all those images
of scary stuff like an alligator eating an egret, or Chaplin in a
cage with a lion). And Jean-Louis Comolli did an endless series on
the real history of deep focus filmmaking pre-25 and post-Kane to
reveal the ideological underpinnings of Bazin's curious argument that
the technique showed "more of reality" or showed it "whole," while
demonstrating that, pace AB, ideology drives technical evolution and
not vice versa. Eventually they hared off into aberrant or
metaphorical uses of the word like we've been seeing on this board -
eg Bunuel practicing a "realism of codes." But it was fun while it
lasted.
So there's all that, but I don't think it invalidates Dan's theory of
film, which we've been getting in dribs and drabs while he gamely
defends his use of what is, after all, a pretty standard vocabulary
to enunciate it. I am most interested in the way he seems to be
saying (without using these terms) that convention is to realism as
the pleasure principle is to the reality principle - bearing in mind
that in Freud's metapsychology, the pleasure principle comes first,
while the reality principle is an outgrowth of it which Freud
eventually had to explain by positing the death instinct to explain
the organism's ability to endure and use unpleasurable sensations to
do "reality testing," generate anxiety and construct the ego. Am I
just blowin' smoke, Dan?
1314
From: Dan Sallitt
Date: Wed Aug 20, 2003 5:48am
Subject: Re: Realism erratum
> So there's all that, but I don't think it invalidates Dan's theory of
> film, which we've been getting in dribs and drabs while he gamely
> defends his use of what is, after all, a pretty standard vocabulary
> to enunciate it. I am most interested in the way he seems to be
> saying (without using these terms) that convention is to realism as
> the pleasure principle is to the reality principle - bearing in mind
> that in Freud's metapsychology, the pleasure principle comes first,
> while the reality principle is an outgrowth of it which Freud
> eventually had to explain by positing the death instinct to explain
> the organism's ability to endure and use unpleasurable sensations to
> do "reality testing," generate anxiety and construct the ego. Am I
> just blowin' smoke, Dan?
In other words, that convention forces realism into existence as a kind
of counterpoise? I think that might be a little more subjectivity than
I'm ready for.
It's not that I don't believe in reality, it's that I believe that every
film, maybe every art work, is born at the place where its realism meets
its artifice. And it doesn't matter if it's TALES OF HOFFMANN or
FARREBIQUE, it doesn't matter where the meeting occurs, because it has
much the same effect wherever it occurs. So, even though I believe in
reality, I don't think it's meaningful to talk about a realistic or an
anti-realistic film: if something is a film, than it's a little of both.
- Dan
1315
From: Damien Bona
Date: Wed Aug 20, 2003 6:50am
Subject: Re: Schickel
--- In a_film_by@yahoogroups.com, "hotlove666"
wrote:
>I met him once recently - he looks like John Wayne these days, and
>is about as prickly.
I once did a television show on which Schickel was a participant from
a video remote location. I completely lost it when another
participant whispered to me while Schickel was talking that he had
morphed into corrupt Chicago congressperson Dan Rostenkowski.
1316
From: hotlove666
Date: Wed Aug 20, 2003 6:57am
Subject: Dan's Theory
But you do equate realism with unpleasure and convention with
pleasure, or was that a passing fancy?
1317
From: hotlove666
Date: Wed Aug 20, 2003 7:34am
Subject: Realism and Genre
The use of an excerpt from a genre film in a non-genre film in this
country begins at least as early as the Red River excerpt in Last
Picture Show - perhaps earlier. (Group? Remember - it has to be in a
non-genre film.) But by the time we get to Texasville, nothing's left
but the Red River soundtrack over a blue sky - a moment that will be
recognized someday as one of the high points of late 20th Century
art.
There's a whole story, too, about how a clip from Mogambo was
replaced by a clip from Gloria in the scene where Cybill Sheppard is
watching tv at night and crying. When I told PB he had copied
Courtship of Eddie's Father - unconsciously! - he replaced the clip.
True story. One meaning of the Eddie's Father scene being reproduced
in Texasville, as pointed out by Michel Mardore in CdC back when, is
that it proves that artifice can make us cry when reality fails -
Glenn Ford hasn't been able to mourn his wife's death until he is
watching Ava Gardner sing "When a Body Meets a Body, and I believe
the same thing happened with CS's character, who has lost a child...
until Peter replaced the clip because he was sick of being The
Hommage Director. I saw the version with the Ford reference (which is
really a Minnelli reference) at the cast and screw screening, but
when the film came out it was Gloria. Did he leave it in the Showtime
remix, or are all the tv screens in that sequence turned away from
the camera now?
In Reversal of Fortune Barbet Schroeder uses a tv clip from The
Crimson Pirate because von Bulow is a pirate; but also to contrast
with what he's making: a non-genre film; and also to allude to the
formal elements that carry over from Hollywood filmmaking into his
non-genre film (the lighting particularly in that one)...
A whole history could be written of this device - embedding a little
piece of convention (or should we call it a symbol/product of the
Imagination, like the Romantics?) in a realistic work. It was pretty
basic to all the New Waves, here and abroad, at a certain time.
1318
From:
Date: Wed Aug 20, 2003 3:50am
Subject: Texasville and Gloria
In a message dated 8/20/03 12:36:30 AM, hotlove666@y... writes:
>Did he leave it in the Showtime
>remix, or are all the tv screens in that sequence turned away from
>the camera now?
It's "Gloria" in the laserdisc special edition of the film, which I take to
be the Showtime remix. The use of "Magombo" sounds interesting, but I'm kinda
partial to the use of "Gloria"... it seems like such a modest, sweet
tip-of-the-hat to not only a great filmmaker, but a good friend. A return of the favor
for Cassavetes having Bogdanovich direct a scene in "Love Streams." But I
don't think he should be concerned about being the Homage Director anymore.
These sort of gestures (I also remember "The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance"
figuring in "The Thing Called Love") are so different than the self-conscious
modeling of "What's Up, Doc?" on "Bringing Up Baby," etc.
Peter
http://hometown.aol.com/ptonguette/index.html
1319
From: George Robinson
Date: Wed Aug 20, 2003 9:46am
Subject: Re: Re: Schickle
Buhle also co-authored a biography of one of my heroes, Abraham Polonsky, that is so filled with factual errors, errors of omission and emphasis that after reading twenty pages I threw it across the room. Given that this is likely to be the only Polonsky bio we'll ever get, this borders on the tragic.
A great example of what happens when non-film people with an agenda write about film.
g
Alas, where is human nature so
weak as in a bookstore?
-Henry Ward Beecher
----- Original Message -----
From: Damien Bona
To: a_film_by@yahoogroups.com
Sent: Tuesday, August 19, 2003 10:55 PM
Subject: [a_film_by] Re: Schickle
--- In a_film_by@yahoogroups.com, ptonguette@a... wrote:
>
> Now Pat McGilligan is a great scholar/biographer. As Vinny knows,
I'm a big
> fan of much of his work. I wonder if he has Internet access and/or
is aware
> of our group?
>
Tender Comrades, which Pat McGilligan edited with Paul Buhle, is one
of my favorite books ever, a collection of interviews with Hollywood
blacklistees. The book is heartbreaking, inspirational and gallows-
funny, and it also reminds you that even though Stalin betrayed the
idealism of the Left, that idealism is still something to be
cherished. The blacklisted artists -- and the teachers, trade
unionists, writers, etc. -- who didn't give friendly evidence will
always remain at the pantheon of my personal heroes.
As an indication of how essential a film/social history scholar
McGilligan is, the book Radical Hollywood, which Paul Buhle wrote not
with McGilligan but Dave Wagner, borders on the embarrassing with its
hypothesis that any film on which a lefty was inolved -- even the
lovably absurd and inept The Kid From Cleveland -- is a major work
precisely because lefties were involved. McGilligan is much more
objective than that (although, of course, a terrible film in which
lefties were involved is still inherently better than a terrible film
in which right-wingers were involved).
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[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
1320
From: George Robinson
Date: Wed Aug 20, 2003 10:26am
Subject: Re: Query: John Hughes
I was only mildly shocked to learn from the list of John Hughes's death, although it is unfortunate. I also knew John moderately well in the late 1970s and ran into him once or twice at screenings in the '80s. He had always had kidney problems and trouble keeping his weight down; given that this is almost two decades ago, I can't say I'm too surprised by his passing.
Did anyone on the list ever see his film? I believe the title was "U.S. 1."
The Thousand Eyes wasn't really John's magazine. It began life as an informal journal put out by Roger McNiven and Howard Mandelbaum, geared to their interests and orthodox auteurist tastes. At some point, and I can't recall clearly when or how, Sid Geffen bought them out and began to use the magazine as a mouthpiece for his theaters, the Bleecker Street and the Carnegie Hall Cinema. In its final incarnation, I was the managing editor and Steve Handzo, who was then on the faculty at Columbia, was the publisher. (Steve was also my thesis adviser at CU at the time, so I suppose there's a conflict of interest there, but that's Columbia's problem.) We turned it into a monthly geared towards covering the entire range of NYC rep programming, which was still formidable back then (1977). It was, if I say so myself, a damned good magazine that did everything from a massive George Cukor special to interviews with people like Francesco Rosi. We also were one of the few popular-oriented film publications in the city to regularly cover experimental film.
(What happened eventually is what always happened with Sid; he kept asking us to do more work for the theaters and kept jerking us around over money. One Friday afternoon he came in and told us he was pulling the plug on the magazine, but if we could raise some absurd amount of capital by Monday morning he'd sell it to us. I ended up having to haul him before the State Department of Labor to get a significant amount of back wages owed me.But that is another story. )
John was a frequent contributor to Thousand Eyes and before Steve and I came in did a few one-shot special issues (Rivette and Bernadette Lafont, if I remember correctly). As David quite correctly recalls, John was particularly enamored of Rivette at the time -- indeed, everyone I knew was -- and was typically hyperbolic on the that subject.
John was like one of those John Ford characters who runs a fine line of blarney; you can't tell if anything he says is true but it all is hilarious and inventive. Then one day the son-of-a-gun saves your ass. John could be a pain, but he was also a tremendously generous and very funny guy. To this day, I find myself quoting one of his best lines in conversation: "George, when you're educated by the Jesuits [as he was], the expect you to become either a fascist or a communist. And they don't care which one."
Yeah, I'm sorry to hear about John.
George Robinson
Alas, where is human nature so
weak as in a bookstore?
-Henry Ward Beecher
----- Original Message -----
From: David Ehrenstein
To: a_film_by@yahoogroups.com
Sent: Tuesday, August 19, 2003 9:52 AM
Subject: Re: [a_film_by] Query: John Hughes
Now thee'sa name I haven't heard in a poon's age! When
did he pass?
In my files I've got a copy of his magazine "The
Thousand Eyes." In fact, as I recall, I wrote
something for it once.
Hughes was very hung-up on middle-period Rivette,
especially "Out One." His auteurism was such that he
seemed to imagine a kind of "Vulcan Mind-Meld" with
the filmmakers he admired -- one in which he'd
actually replace them, In his interview with Rivette
Hughes is especially impatient to complete Rivette's
sentences.
--- Adrian Martin wrote:
> Dear crew -
>
> I have always been intrigued by the work of the late
> John Hughes - not the
> American or Australian film directors of that name,
> but the American film
> critic who wrote for various publications in the 70s
> including FILM COMMENT
> and REAR WINDOW. His writing was really lively and
> inspiring. But I know
> very little about his life and times. Can anyone on
> the list offer any
> insight?
>
> thanks, Adrian Martin
>
>
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1321
From: David Ehrenstein
Date: Wed Aug 20, 2003 1:14pm
Subject: Re: Realism and Genre
My favorite example of cinematic quotation is in "The
King of Comedy." Jerry watches "Pickup on South
Street" on television -- the scene where Widmark lifts
what turns out to be microfilm fromJean peters on the
subway. This sequence of shots is later echoed in
Scorsese's film when Dihanne Abbott steals an ashtray
from Jerry's house.
--- hotlove666 wrote:
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1322
From: hotlove666
Date: Wed Aug 20, 2003 3:20pm
Subject: John Hughes
I saw US 1. I hope someone has kept a copy. I believe there was a
second one, which includes a shot-sequence where a Mafiosa is reading
from a porn book in the bathtub, during which he keeps pausing to
pull rubber lobsters, crabs, snakes etc. out of the water. An
unforgettable moment. The 1000 Eyes John did was Lafont - a followup
to my Cahiers issue. There never was a Rivette, or it'd be a
collector's item. I've been in shock since Adrian's announcement - we
were really good friends. I'm going to e-mail Jacky, who may be the
source of the news, via JR, who told Adrian, to see if it's really
true before doing a full-scale reminiscence. That's a great quote
about the Jesuits.
1323
From: jess_l_amortell
Date: Wed Aug 20, 2003 3:23pm
Subject: Re: Realism and Genre
--- In a_film_by@yahoogroups.com, "hotlove666" wrote:
> The use of an excerpt from a genre film in a non-genre film in this
> country begins at least as early as the Red River excerpt in Last
> Picture Show - perhaps earlier. (Group? Remember - it has to be in a
> non-genre film.)
Mason's son watches a western on TV in Bigger Than Life (we do see it, don't we? -- suddenly I'm not sure) -- around the same time a TV was wheeled into Jane Wyman's home. It's presumably just a generic TV western, so it doesn't count as quotation, but it makes me wonder when television was first used to display film in film.
> A whole history could be written of this device - embedding a little
> piece of convention (or should we call it a symbol/product of the
> Imagination, like the Romantics?) in a realistic work.
A related device might be the use of a theater marquee. In Daisy Kenyon, the (recently vanished) Greenwich Theater outside the restaurant window is playing, I believe, Woman in the Window. (Is Daisy Kenyon a non-genre film? At least, it's a different genre.)
1324
From: David Ehrenstein
Date: Wed Aug 20, 2003 3:49pm
Subject: Re: John Hughes
I treasure my copy of the Laffont interview.
--- hotlove666 wrote:
> I saw US 1. I hope someone has kept a copy. I
> believe there was a
> second one, which includes a shot-sequence where a
> Mafiosa is reading
> from a porn book in the bathtub, during which he
> keeps pausing to
> pull rubber lobsters, crabs, snakes etc. out of the
> water. An
> unforgettable moment. The 1000 Eyes John did was
> Lafont - a followup
> to my Cahiers issue. There never was a Rivette, or
> it'd be a
> collector's item. I've been in shock since Adrian's
> announcement - we
> were really good friends. I'm going to e-mail Jacky,
> who may be the
> source of the news, via JR, who told Adrian, to see
> if it's really
> true before doing a full-scale reminiscence. That's
> a great quote
> about the Jesuits.
>
>
__________________________________
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1325
From: Eric Henderson
Date: Wed Aug 20, 2003 4:04pm
Subject: Fassbinder: Maria Braun & Lola...
Alright, it's probably time enough to stop ghosting here and post a
little something to say "hello to everyone" and "love what I'm
reading, even if my thick skull doesn't understand what I'm reading."
This weekend I went to the first leg of a minor Fassbinder
retrospective at Oak Street Cinema in Minneapolis
(www.oakstreetcinema.org) and saw "Lola" and "The Marriage of Maria
Braun," in that order. I don't know whether seeing them in that order
as opposed to their chronological placement had any effect on my take
on them, or that it matters, but I found them both provocative and
uneven. Clearly, Fassbinder is critical of the "economic miracle," or
at least the whitewashing psychological effect it had on Germans in
the decade immediately following WWII. But the two films seem so
radically different in tone. My first reaction was that "Lola" was a
fluffy "surface" film, and that "Maria Braun" represents the true
sturm und drang of Fassbinder's bitter P.O.V. But the more I
pondered the two against each other, and as I found myself dwelling
on what seemed a very pat and overly ironic conclusion to "Maria
Braun," the more I consider the equally sweet-toothed ending
to "Lola" more interesting and downbeat. Put it this way, the tragedy
of "Maria Braun" (at least in the end) is purely accidental
(metaphoric possibly, but still accidental). On the other hand, Maria
manages to be in control at practically all times of her destiny and
her political/ideological grasp. At the end of "Lola," Lola has her
life and (one might say) her happiness, but has lost (or, rather,
hasn't gained) her ultimate ideological dream of independence and
equality. She might have pulled strings to bring about an end to the
political schizm in her little burg, but at the end of the day, she's
still a whore. The bluntly cheery tone Fassbinder infuses the final
scenes with (absolutely bathed in sunny yellow gels) affirms his
cynical notion that selling-out is tragically easy.
Obviously there's a lot to chew on in both of these films, but I need
to see them both again. I hope to catch "Lili Marleen" and "The
Merchant of Four Seasons" later.
1326
From: Dan Sallitt
Date: Wed Aug 20, 2003 5:01pm
Subject: Re: Fassbinder: Maria Braun & Lola...
> But the more I
> pondered the two against each other, and as I found myself dwelling
> on what seemed a very pat and overly ironic conclusion to "Maria
> Braun,"
Welcome, Eric.
You could argue that the ending to MARIA BRAUN is so obviously and
casually tipped off that it's in quotation marks. (Where's that word
"Brechtian" when you need it?) Fassbinder doesn't play the ending for
pathos or even sorrow - he pushes us back emotionally enough for us to
see the abstraction of ending the film with that particular big bang.
Maria was identified with both the emotional deprivation and the
economic change of the time she lived in: when the emotional deprivation
ends and the economic transformation is accomplished, she serves no
further symbolic function, so Fassbinder gets rid of her in a big way. - Dan
1328
From: hotlove666
Date: Wed Aug 20, 2003 5:19pm
Subject: Genre and Realism
Daisy Kenyon is so mature I think of it not as a weepie, but as a
filmed novel with a female protagonist - so in that case the
puzzling reference to Woman in the Window would count.
The cowboy show on tv in Bigger Than Life is THE stock image
of the period to denounce the vapidity of tv. (Cf. Avery's TV of the
Future.) Doesn't Mason make one of his snippy remraks and
turn it off? The film kind of sides with him on that, and I've always
seen the title as a reference to the 'Scope image as a bigger
than life riposte to the incursions of tv, so that would fit in - as
would contrasting the artifice of the dumb cowboy show to the
true-life (non-genre) film we're watching, however gorgeous the
latter may be.
As an aside, Greg Ford always maintained that the
frame-within-the-frame (in the purely plastic sense) in Ray's
work (and other people's work) appeared when tv came along.
The prologue to Rock Hunter would be an obvious example.
Certainly if that's true Ray carried it on after tv was no longer an
issue, in the four-image images of We Can't Go Home Again. He
told me that it was a dramatic device, whether in Wind Across the
Everglades or in We Can't... -- using one area of the screen to
enhance or comment on the emotion going on in another area of
the same shot.
1329
From: Dan Sallitt
Date: Wed Aug 20, 2003 4:51pm
Subject: Re: Dan's Theory
> But you do equate realism with unpleasure and convention with
> pleasure, or was that a passing fancy?
Oh, that. More than a passing fancy and less than a worked-out theory,
I think. Still mulling it over.
One obvious trouble is that there are so many ways to get pleasure and
people who differ in how they get it. Still, if you think about changes
in art fashion that have been dubbed realistic, a great many of them
replace a convention that's part of an entertainment tradition, and
substitute one that seems artier or more minimal. Of course, then the
new set of conventions can become the pleasure of a new generation:
witness how some younger filmgoers reject old Hollywood films on grounds
of insufficient realism. These filmgoers certainly get more pleasure
from the more "realistic" Hollywood films of the 70s than those of the
40s or 50s. Here the artifice that once gave pleasure has become alien.
You can make an argument that all the major innovations in mainstream
cinema - sound, color, widescreen, 3-D, bigger film formats - are more
realistic than what came before. Certainly each major change has made
some aesthetes fearful that there wouldn't be enough artifice left over
to constitute art. And yet my sense is that the majority of filmgoers
did not label these changes realistic. Maybe because they were
entertaining. On the other hand, if you drain all the color out of a
Western's palette, the word "realism" is at the tip of everyone's
tongue, despite the evident fact that driving through the West is a much
prettier experience than watching these films. There's something of
denial in the word's connotations.
- Dan
1330
From: Damien Bona
Date: Wed Aug 20, 2003 6:24pm
Subject: Movie Marquees
--- In a_film_by@yahoogroups.com, "jess_l_amortell"
wrote:
>
> A related device might be the use of a theater marquee. In Daisy
>Kenyon, the (recently vanished) Greenwich Theater outside the
>restaurant window is playing, I believe, Woman in the Window. (Is
>Daisy Kenyon a non-genre film? At least, it's a different genre.)
In Daisy, Woman In The Window is the second-half of a double
feature. The main attraction is Mr. Lucky, and the theatre is the
Greenwich at Greenwich Avenue and 12th STreet, which lasted until
just a few years ago. Now a gym stands on that location.
The best double-bill I ever saw in a movie was in Jonathan Demme's
Crazy Mama, in which a drive-in theatre is showing Vertigo and Man of
the West.
1331
From: Tristan
Date: Wed Aug 20, 2003 6:55pm
Subject: Rohmer and Rivette
I'm a fan of Truffaut, Chabrol, and Godard, but I've never seen any
films from Rohmer or Rivette. What would be the best films to start
with?
1332
From: Dan Sallitt
Date: Wed Aug 20, 2003 7:06pm
Subject: Re: Rohmer and Rivette
> I'm a fan of Truffaut, Chabrol, and Godard, but I've never seen any
> films from Rohmer or Rivette. What would be the best films to start
> with?
With Rivette, I'm pretty confident that CELINE AND JULIE GO BOATING is
the place to start. It's good, it conveys Rivette quite well, and it's
entertaining.
With Rohmer, you might as well start where most of the world started,
with MY NIGHT AT MAUD'S and CLAIRE'S KNEE.
- Dan
1333
From: Fred Camper
Date: Wed Aug 20, 2003 6:42pm
Subject: Re: Movie Marquees
Yeah, but my favorite such moment, unless there's one I've forgotten, is
the shot of the marquee showing "Shock Corridor" that appears in the
Naked Kiss.
Presumably Fuller had seen a few New Wave films with their in-references?
- Fred
1334
From: Dan Sallitt
Date: Wed Aug 20, 2003 8:06pm
Subject: Re: Movie Marquees
> Yeah, but my favorite such moment, unless there's one I've forgotten, is
> the shot of the marquee showing "Shock Corridor" that appears in the
> Naked Kiss.
>
> Presumably Fuller had seen a few New Wave films with their in-references?
Yes, but the Nouvelle Vague had a tendency to do homages to other
people's films. Fuller was getting in early on a self-homage trend that
later became an epidemic in Hollywood: at a certain point in the 80s or
90s, I remember thinking that second-time filmmakers should be
prohibited from inserting references to their first films. - Dan
1335
From:
Date: Wed Aug 20, 2003 4:18pm
Subject: Re: Movie Marquees
In a message dated 8/20/03 4:09:03 PM, f@f... writes:
>Yeah, but my favorite such moment, unless there's one I've forgotten, is
>the shot of the marquee showing "Shock Corridor" that appears in the
>Naked Kiss.
Another fun instance of this sort of explicit self-referencing is when "In
Harm's Way" shows up on television at the beginning of "Skidoo."
Peter
http://hometown.aol.com/ptonguette/index.html
1336
From: Fred Camper
Date: Wed Aug 20, 2003 7:13pm
Subject: Re: Rohmer and Rivette
Tristan wrote:
> Rivette. What would be the best films to start
>with?
>
>
>
I second Dan on "Celine and Julie Go Boating."
Don't be dissuaded by the light comedic tone; it's much more profound
than that. The intercutting of different spaces is amazing.
If you could get it, the over four hour "L'Amour Fou" is a particular
favorite of mine. It's pretty austere though.
"Up Down Fragile" is a great recent one. I've missed some other recent ones.
- Fred
1337
From: David Ehrenstein
Date: Wed Aug 20, 2003 8:18pm
Subject: Re: Rohmer and Rivette
Roher:"My Night at Maud's," "Pauline at the Beach,"
"Summer" and if you can find it "Four Adventures of
Reinette and Mirabelle."
Rivette: "Paris Belongs to Us," "La Religieuse,"
"Celine and Julie Go Boating," "Wuthering Heights,"
and "Va Savoir."
"Duelle" and "Noroit" aren't available on home video,
alas.
--- Tristan wrote:
> I'm a fan of Truffaut, Chabrol, and Godard, but I've
> never seen any
> films from Rohmer or Rivette. What would be the best
> films to start
> with?
>
>
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1338
From:
Date: Wed Aug 20, 2003 4:43pm
Subject: Re: Rohmer and Rivette
Tristan, I'll "third" Dan on "Celine and Julie Go Boating." A brilliant film
in many ways and a very good one to start with. "Va Savoir" is another
recent one that's very accessible to those new to Rivette; it's great anyway, with
some stunning uses of space and a very pleasurable, light tone.
In terms of Rohmer, I'll add "Chloe in the Afternoon" and "Summer" (my two
favorite Rohmers) to Dan's selections. Either of the four Dan and I have
mentioned should give you an idea of what Rohmer's all about. Later on, I'd
recommend getting into his very interesting and formally idiosyncratic period films,
"Perceval" and the wonderful "The Lady and the Duke."
Peter
http://hometown.aol.com/ptonguette/index.html
1339
From: hotlove666
Date: Wed Aug 20, 2003 10:12pm
Subject: Rivette, Rohmer
For what's it worth, I'd see:
L'Amour Fou and Haut bas fragile for Rivette - in for a penny, in
for a pound - and Celine and Julie, I guess, though I'm not as my
colleagues are that that one still holds up. Drugs....
It really is a shame that Duelle, Noroit and Merry-Go-Round
aren't available on tape. That's his "John Hughes" period, and by
far his best. Secret Defense is kind of a default part four of that
group, which was supposed to be a tetralogy about the doings of
a moon goddess and a sun goddess among mortals. It's really
one of the better post-amphetamine psychosis films, with Pont
du Nord (is that available?) and Haut bas fragile. Most of these
are so hard to find that if you come across La bande des quatre
or La religieuse or Va savoir or either version of La belle
noiseuse, go for it. Rivette is not a perfectionist, and if you go
looking for his handful of masterworks, you could be looking a
long time.
For Rohmer, I'd lay off the early work and go to these unequalled
late films for starters:
An Autumn Tale
Conte de Printemps
Nuits de la pleine lune
Pauline at the Beach
The Marquise of O
Having seen five world-class absolute masterpieces that will
make you think you've died and gone to heaven, you can then
follow up by seeing the whole oeuvre in chronological order --
and you will almost certainly want to!
Re: Film quotes - Barbet Schroeder and Peter Bogdanovich
weren't doing homages or in-jokes with Crimson Pirate and Red
River. The embedding of those borrowed images in films very
unlike them was saying something about the much-vexed (on
this board) topics of genre and realism. Jamie Lee Curtis and
her friends watching The Thing in Halloween is really coals to
Newcastle in comparison, and the same goes for all those
marquee nods I've been reading about.
1340
From: Damien Bona
Date: Wed Aug 20, 2003 11:09pm
Subject: Realism; Genres; Eric
This is certainly a fascinating and complex subject, and is worthy of
a semester-long course. And there have been so many posts that I
can't recall who said exactly what.
Isn't it axiomatic that we all have our own "reality," and thus so it
is with any artist, no matter what medium he or she is working in.
Paintings which purport to be realistic renderings of people places
or events -- whether it is the genre paintings of a Greuze or the
super-realism of Phillip Pearlstein to name just two of literally
hundreds of thousands of possible examples – are, of course, only
interpretations of reality. I certainly think that Monet's London
paintings are more redolent of the real world than the photorealism
of someone like (yuchh) Don Eddy.
Even in photography, Berenice Abbott, Ruth Orkin and Helen Leavitt
shot photos of New York City at mid-century, and their pictures are
distinctive and personal.
Don't we look to art not for renditions of reality but for am
artist's interpretation of life, as a new and/or interesting way of
looking at life?
I think it's fascinating how De Sica and Rossellini both are
routinely mentioned as paradigms of neo-realism, and yet De Sica's
films to me are artificial from the get-go, as phony as the most
contrived Hollywood movie, while Open City and Germany Year Zero just
overflow with "life" because of the heightened emotionalism that
comes through the neo-realism surface in Rossellini's films. Umberto
D with its crabby old codger and his dog rings less true to me
than do Edmund Gwenn and Lassie in Hills of Home.
The Pirate is a musical fantasy, and yet it reflects Vincente
Minnelli's view of reality and the struggles of the artist against
societal constraints. It speaks of the real world much more than,
say, Dog Day Afternoon or On The Waterfront, films that are
considered in the realist tradition.
Yoel Meranda wrote:
> I'm sure almost everybody here will agree that to understand
> Ray's
> Bitter Victory (a war film, and I agree that I don't need a
> definition to know that) seeing other Rays will help more than
seeing
> other war films (am I wrong?).
Do we have to decide that one is more helpful than the other? Seeing
other Nick Ray movies and seeing a slew of war movies are both
important in helping one understand and appreciate Bitter Victory
(although one could argue that Bitter Victory is more of a
psychological character study than war movie, and that seeing Three
Faces of Eve is as helpful as seeing The Desert Rats). And on top of
that, it's also beneficial to see other movies from 1957, and other
movies written by Gavin Lambert and Vladimir Pozner, and to have some
knowledge of Nick Ray's personal life as well as his movies, and an
acquaintance with the North African campaign in WW2. In short, the
more you know about any number of subjects, the better you can
dissect and comprehend a movie, and I would certainly hold that genre
conventions are among those subjects.
I recently watched David Butler's San Antonio, primarily as a
juxtaposition film to the Errol Flynn vehicles directed by Walsh. I
firmly believe that it is important occasionally to take a look-see
at works by minor, amiable craftsmen in order to better understand
what it is that makes a films by a true artist (such as Walsh) so
memorable. Although San Antonio was more lavish than any of the
Walsh pictures (I believe it was Warners' most expensive movie up to
1945), it just kind of lays there. The character nuances, the
superb use of landscape as a such a defining force that it
practically becomes a character in and of itself, the psychological
depth and the sheer exuberance and ribald camaraderie are just not
present, and while San Antonio is enjoyable enough, so are Tim Holt
westerns directed by Lesley Selander. Similarly, when I took a
college course in film melodrama, the professor (Mike Stern) showed
us Jerry Hopper's Never Say Goodbye (which, I believe, Sirk was
originally slated to direct), in order for us to see how truly
radical and individualistic all of the Sirk pictures he was showing
were.
Hi, Eric. Glad to see that you made it over here to A Film By!
1341
From: Ruy Gardnier
Date: Wed Aug 20, 2003 11:18pm
Subject: Re: Rohmer and Rivette
I really love Rohmer's "historic" films, MARQUISE D'O, PERCEVAL LE GALOIS
and L'ANGLAISE ET LE DUC. Also love 4 AVENTURES DE REINETTE & MIRABELLE,
L'ARBRE LA MER ET LA MEDIATEQUE, PAULINE A LA PLAGE, LA COLLECTIONEUSE (very
similar to some Rivette work with the actors) and LE GENOU DE CLAIRE. my
favorite season tale is the WINTER TALE.
for Rivette, I haven't seen it all, haven't seen CELINE ET JULIE, but I
really like LA BELLE NOISEUSE and L'AMOUR FOU, which I have in a terribly
bad video copy. VA SAVOIR is lovely.
ruy
----- Original Message -----
From:
To:
Sent: Wednesday, August 20, 2003 5:43 PM
Subject: Re: [a_film_by] Rohmer and Rivette
> Tristan, I'll "third" Dan on "Celine and Julie Go Boating." A brilliant
film
> in many ways and a very good one to start with. "Va Savoir" is another
> recent one that's very accessible to those new to Rivette; it's great
anyway, with
> some stunning uses of space and a very pleasurable, light tone.
>
> In terms of Rohmer, I'll add "Chloe in the Afternoon" and "Summer" (my two
> favorite Rohmers) to Dan's selections. Either of the four Dan and I have
> mentioned should give you an idea of what Rohmer's all about. Later on,
I'd
> recommend getting into his very interesting and formally idiosyncratic
period films,
> "Perceval" and the wonderful "The Lady and the Duke."
>
> Peter
>
> http://hometown.aol.com/ptonguette/index.html
>
>
> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to:
> a_film_by-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com
>
>
>
> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
>
>
1342
From: Dan Sallitt
Date: Wed Aug 20, 2003 11:21pm
Subject: Re: Realism; Genres; Eric
> I recently watched David Butler's San Antonio, primarily as a
> juxtaposition film to the Errol Flynn vehicles directed by Walsh.
But isn't it sometimes said that Walsh directed some of SAN ANTONIO?
Does anyone know the production history? - Dan
1343
From: David Ehrenstein
Date: Wed Aug 20, 2003 11:21pm
Subject: Re: Realism; Genres; Eric
"And on top of
that, it's also beneficial to see other movies from
1957, and other
movies written by Gavin Lambert and Vladimir Pozner,
and to have some
knowledge of Nick Ray's personal life as well as his
movies, and an
acquaintance with the North African campaign in WW2."
Did Ray have an affair with Pozner too?
--- Damien Bona wrote:
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1344
From: David Ehrenstein
Date: Wed Aug 20, 2003 11:18pm
Subject: Re: Rivette, Rohmer
I understand that"La bande des Quatre" ("Jacques
Rivette's School For Actresses") will shortly be
available on home video.
I long for the release of the complete "Out One: Noli
Me Tangare."
"Secret Defense" is closer in mood to earlier
paranoid-conspiracy Rivette's than it is to the
"Scenes de La Vie Parallele" series.
--- hotlove666 wrote:
>
>
>
__________________________________
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1345
From: Eric Henderson
Date: Thu Aug 21, 2003 1:17am
Subject: Re: Realism (subjectivity); De Sica; Dan (on Braun)
Hey Damien. Good to see you too.
--- "Damien Bona" wrote:
> Isn't it axiomatic that we all have our own "reality," and thus so it
> is with any artist, no matter what medium he or she is working in?
This is, in my opinion, a key point (though it might only be key because I'=
m
operating under my own notion of the reality of key points). All it takes i=
s to
suggest to someone that I think Verhoeven paints a more accurate (or at lea=
st
more cynically question-raising) portrait of America today than many other =
(more jingoistic) action directors like Ridley Scott and wait for their rea=
ction to
sell me on this point.
So, one wonders what is it about De Sica that invites the label of realism?=
Is it
something so simple as his eye-level framing (suggesting verité, I guess)? =
his
propensity for taking mutliple emotional detours through any given scene (t=
he
scene where the son gets slapped and the aftermath in "Bicycle Thief" is an=
example), which feels removed enough from mainstream-narrative emotional
peaks-and-valleys as to be mistakenly placed as opposed to mainstream
narration, and therefore "realism"? the fact that melodrama is, to many, ak=
in to
the emotions they withhold (what is kept in check is typically more "dramat=
ic"
than what is manifested in public)?
Interesting that Rossellini uses many of these same elements ('cepting, of =
course, of the clinical eye-level cinematography) and manages to . I'm not =
sure, after reading some of these posts, if I would be more comfortable
labelling Rossellini's carefully constructed films "realism," but because t=
hey
feel more fully realized, well, they're more realistic *to me*. (Ah, subjec=
tivity.)
Dan, your explanation on the ending of "Braun" makes a lot of sense.
Although I knew that there was the ol' Brechtian removal of narrative (dige=
tic?)
purpose in that explosion, I never put it into context with Fassbinder's us=
e of
Maria as a syphonistic character. How embarrassing... it was practically
drawn in exclamation points. Heck, Fassbinder rolled the closing credits ov=
er
half the scene!
- E
1346
From: George Robinson
Date: Thu Aug 21, 2003 1:24am
Subject: Re: Rohmer and Rivette
Excellent list, but I would add the very neglected and quite wonderful "The Aviator's Wife" to the Rohmer list.
g
Alas, where is human nature so
weak as in a bookstore?
-Henry Ward Beecher
----- Original Message -----
From: David Ehrenstein
To: a_film_by@yahoogroups.com
Sent: Wednesday, August 20, 2003 4:18 PM
Subject: Re: [a_film_by] Rohmer and Rivette
Roher:"My Night at Maud's," "Pauline at the Beach,"
"Summer" and if you can find it "Four Adventures of
Reinette and Mirabelle."
Rivette: "Paris Belongs to Us," "La Religieuse,"
"Celine and Julie Go Boating," "Wuthering Heights,"
and "Va Savoir."
"Duelle" and "Noroit" aren't available on home video,
alas.
--- Tristan wrote:
> I'm a fan of Truffaut, Chabrol, and Godard, but I've
> never seen any
> films from Rohmer or Rivette. What would be the best
> films to start
> with?
>
>
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1347
From: Dan Sallitt
Date: Thu Aug 21, 2003 2:51am
Subject: Re: Rohmer and Rivette
> Excellent list, but I would add the very neglected and quite wonderful "The Aviator's Wife" to the Rohmer list.
Yeah, this film is wonderful, isn't it? - Dan
1348
From: Dan Sallitt
Date: Thu Aug 21, 2003 2:50am
Subject: Re: Rivette, Rohmer
> I long for the release of the complete "Out One: Noli
> Me Tangare."
Yeah, now that the digital era is with us, why not? Seems as if the
sheer novelty of it would make it worth some DVD distributor's while. - Dan
1349
From: hotlove666
Date: Thu Aug 21, 2003 4:13am
Subject: The Unanswered Question(s)
I consider Kiarostami's "educational films" documentaries (the ones
I've seen). For me an essay film has a narration by the filmmaker.
Kiarostami is indeed in the Romantic tradition, however he came by
it. When I talked to him he certainly knew Marx and Freud, so I don't
see why his knowledge of the west would stop there. You can see
something very much like Joyce's epiphanies in The Dubliners in
K's "early, politcal ones," which I like a lot: Experience, The
Traveller, the one about the husband who hits his wife (I forget the
title). At the end of each, when the character has had a big defeat
and suddenl;y sees himself in a clear but very cold light, K cuts to
a high angle shot of him for the first time in the film. Formally,
this seems to me to be the exact cinematic equivalent of the ending
of "Counterparts," say. That final high angle changes meaning in the
last two parts of the Friend's House trilogy, becoming maybe a little
banal.
I really like the "early, political ones," which show Iran under the
Shah in a very critical light. After the revolution, K has been
skirting trouble with shorts like Homework while mainly making films
about the countryside, more like parables than what he did before.
With Taste of Cherry and, I gather, 10 (I haven't seen it yet), he
has become a social critic again, and I think that's when he's at his
best. The black-and-white Experience, his first feature (completely
unscripted), is still my favorite - I hope it and the others will
become available in this country before the Junta starts bombing HIS
country - those films really open a window into the Land of the Other
that everyone should take a peek through before the loonies start
trashing it.
Talk about a pipe dream...
1350
From: jrosenbaum2002
Date: Thu Aug 21, 2003 5:05am
Subject: Re: Movie Marquees
In fact, Sam saw a lot of New Wave films. The first time I ever met
him, he asked me out of the blue what I thought of Made in USA.
He also put some interesting homages in his novels. The French
generals in The Big Red One are all named after critics who praised
him (Moullet, Tavernier, etc.)
--- In a_film_by@yahoogroups.com, Fred Camper wrote:
> Yeah, but my favorite such moment, unless there's one I've
forgotten, is
> the shot of the marquee showing "Shock Corridor" that appears in
the
> Naked Kiss.
>
> Presumably Fuller had seen a few New Wave films with their in-
references?
>
> - Fred
1351
From: jrosenbaum2002
Date: Thu Aug 21, 2003 5:09am
Subject: Re: John Hughes
Hello gang,
I tried to send another version of this email awhile back, before
becoming a member, and I fear it got lost in cyberspace. So here's
another stab at it.
I'm the source (via Adrian) of the news about John Hughes's death. He
died many years ago, in Paris, and I'm sorry to say that his death
was a suicide--an act that becomes even more depressing when one
recalls his Jesuit background. I hadn't seen him in many years, so I
can only provide fragmentary information, which I believe (I'm not
sure) was conveyed to me by Jackie Raynal.
John had been living for some time with a French woman in Paris who
took care of him--and he was someone whom I believe periodically
needed someone to take care of him. I don't know what he'd been doing
with himself for the preceding several years--my impression is that
he'd been doing very little--but I do know that he'd had periods when
he was psychotic, or very close to that; one of the last times I saw
him in New York, in what was probably the early 80s, was one of those
periods. I also recall him having once told me that he'd been
institutionalized for a spell, long before I met him.
I owe John a lot, because he was one of the main people who convinced
me to move from San Diego to New York in 1979, and he was a
wonderful, loyal, and passionate friend, at least when he was
coherent (which was most of the time, at least within my experience).
He was also quite brilliant. At one point he was a novelist, and I
believe he once had a contract with a major publisher on the basis of
one portion of a manuscript that, to the best of my knowledge, was
never finished. He also worked as a taxi driver in New York for a
spell. During the time when I knew him, he was in the Film Comment/
Thousand Eyes orbit and spent a lot of time with Anatole Dauman in
Paris, working on an interview piece with Oshima (I believe it was
about Empire of Passion) that I don't believe ever came out. It seems
like a lot of his major projects eventually capsized in one way or
another, possibly because of his unstable condition. He also got a
job scripting a movie about Tesla that was made in Yugoslavia and in
which Orson Welles played a role, but it's my impression, based on my
dim memories of that film, that he never received any screen credit.
(Bill will recall that Oja once told him about Orson rewriting some
of his--meaning John's--dialogue on that film.)
I'd love to hear some more reminiscences from others in this group,
including Bill and Dave.
Jonathan
--- In a_film_by@yahoogroups.com, "hotlove666"
wrote:
> I saw US 1. I hope someone has kept a copy. I believe there was a
> second one, which includes a shot-sequence where a Mafiosa is
reading
> from a porn book in the bathtub, during which he keeps pausing to
> pull rubber lobsters, crabs, snakes etc. out of the water. An
> unforgettable moment. The 1000 Eyes John did was Lafont - a
followup
> to my Cahiers issue. There never was a Rivette, or it'd be a
> collector's item. I've been in shock since Adrian's announcement -
we
> were really good friends. I'm going to e-mail Jacky, who may be the
> source of the news, via JR, who told Adrian, to see if it's really
> true before doing a full-scale reminiscence. That's a great quote
> about the Jesuits.
1352
From:
Date: Thu Aug 21, 2003 1:40am
Subject: Movie Marquees
At the end of Show People (King Vidor, 1928), the silent-movie star heroine
and hero have seen the light. They stop making pretentious movie junk, and
start making genuine motion picture art. Such art is clearly a version of The Big
Parade (Vidor, 1925), complete with Vidor himself directing this film within
the film! Earlier, Charlie Chaplin has a nice comic cameo as himself.
Buster Keaton's short The Frozen North (1922) spoofs Erich von Stroheim, with
Buster dressed as the Man You Love to Hate, wandering around the Klondike.
The opening of Our Hospitality (Keaton, Jack Blystone, 1923) seems to parody
Intolerance (Griffith, 1916).
Mack Sennett's studio made countless movie parodies. I'd love to see "She's a
Shiek", with Bebe Daniels spoofing Valentino, and carrying off helpless men
to her tent. (This is the only film in this post I have not seen.)
Good Morning, Babylon (Taviani Brothers, 1987) is a magnificent movie about
the making of the film Intolerance.
The British TV miniseries Flickers (1980) is an extraordinary comedy-drama,
set in the early days of the British film industry. The acting by Bob Hoskins,
Frances de la Tour, and the whole cast seems positively four dimensional. The
subsequent miniseries Pictures (1982), dealing with the later 1920's British
silent industry, is good, but not as magical as the earlier classic. Both
series were written by Roy Clarke. Will Violet ever stop talking?
In My Life to Live (1962), Godard cross cuts between his heroine's tears, and
those of Falconetti in The Passion of Joan of Arc (Dreyer, 1928). Fritz Lang
plays himself in Contempt (Godard, 1963) - and what an amazing color movie!
The movie books ordered by the director in Day for Night (Truffaut, 1976)
form a touching homage to the great directors. Meanwhile, a character played by
Aumont is clearly a tribute to the great Jean Cocteau.
In Samuel Fuller's novel Crown of India (1966), one of the characters goes to
see a Fuller film. If memory serves, they fall asleep in the theater! This is
one of Fuller's best novels.
There are countless Dragnet parodies. Stan Freberg did a great one on
records. In the movies, the characters spoof Dragnet in The Little Shop of Horrors
(Roger Corman, 1960), and twice in Tight Spot (Phil Karlson, 1955). Both of
these spoofs are hilarious. Dragnet 1967 (Webb's TV revival of the series) has an
episode with two con artists who impersonate policemen and who bilk ordinary
people. The two fake cops do a hilarious self-parody of Webb's low key cops.
The PBS series Mathnet (thirty hour long episodes, 1987-1992), is a comic
version of Dragnet. The two leads are police who use mathematics to solve
mysteries (their motto: To Cogitate and Solve). This is one of the most delightful
fusions of math and storytelling ever made. It was a favorite of many grown-ups
in the era, too - the late great mystery writer William L. De Andrea
reportedly loved it. (Me too!)
Mike Grost
1353
From: Jonathan Rosenbaum
Date: Thu Aug 21, 2003 4:07am
Subject: John Hughes again
Hello gang,
I tried to send another version of this email awhile back, before becoming a member, and I fear it got lost in cyberspace. So here's another stab at it.
I'm the source (via Adrian) of the news about John Hughes's death. He died many years ago, in Paris, and I'm sorry to say that his death was a suicide--an act that becomes even more depressing when one recalls his Jesuit background. I hadn't seen him in many years, so I can only provide fragmentary information, which I believe (I'm not sure) was conveyed to me by Jackie Raynal.
John had been living for some time with a French woman in Paris who took care of him--and he was someone whom I believe periodically needed someone to take care of him. I don't know what he'd been doing with himself for the preceding several years--my impression is that he'd been doing very little--but I do know that he'd had periods when he was psychotic, or very close to that; one of the last times I saw him in New York, in what was probably the early 80s, was one of those periods. I also recall him having once told me that he'd been institutionalized for a spell, long before I met him.
I owe John a lot, because he was one of the main people who convinced me to move from San Diego to New York in 1979, and he was a wonderful, loyal, and passionate friend, at least when he was coherent (which was most of the time, at least within my experience). He was also quite brilliant. At one point he was a novelist, and I believe he once had a contract with a major publisher on the basis of one portion of a manuscript that, to the best of my knowledge, was never finished. He also worked as a taxi driver in New York for a spell. During the time when I knew him, he was in the Film Comment/ Thousand Eyes orbit and spent a lot of time with Anatole Dauman in Paris, working on an interview piece with Oshima (I believe it was about Empire of Passion) that I don't believe ever came out. It seems like a lot of his major projects eventually capsized in one way or another, possibly because of his unstable condition. He also got a job scripting a movie about Tesla that was made in
Yugoslavia and in which Orson Welles played a role, but it's my impression, based on my dim memories of that film, that he never received any screen credit. (Bill will recall that Oja once told him about Orson rewriting some of his--meaning John's--dialogue on that film.)
I'd love to hear some more reminiscences from others in this group, including Bill and Dave.
Jonathan
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
1354
From: filipefurtado
Date: Thu Aug 21, 2003 5:41am
Subject: Re: Movie Marquees
> Yeah, but my favorite such moment, unless there's one I've f
orgotten, is
> the shot of the marquee showing "Shock Corridor" that appear
s in the
> Naked Kiss.
I don't know if it's my favorite, but one that I've always be
found of is in Dirty Harry, early during one of the first
action scenes we can see in the background that a near by
theatre is playing Eastwood's Play Misty for Me.
Filipe
>
> Presumably Fuller had seen a few New Wave films with their i
n-references?
>
> - Fred
>
>
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1355
From: filipefurtado
Date: Thu Aug 21, 2003 6:05am
Subject: Re: Rivette, Rohmer
Rohmer - My favorites are the comedies and proverbs, but I
really can't choose among them. I'm a big fan of the period
films but they are after some of the early films (Sign of
Lion, Le Collectenuise) probably the worst place to start.
Maud and Claire's Knee may be the best way, but both the
comedies and proverbs and the tales of four seasons are good
starting poibts as well.
Rivette - Thanks to the awful brazilian distribution of his
films I haven't seen anything before Gang of Four. I've seen
everything after it, I'd say Gang of Four and Up Down Fragile
are the best introduction (Up Down Fragile being my personal
favorite). I don't know with Va Savoir is already out on DVD,
it's more classical than his other films, but it may be a
useful starting point too.
Filipe
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1356
From: filipefurtado
Date: Thu Aug 21, 2003 6:11am
Subject: Re: Rivette, Rohmer
>I understand that"La bande des Quatre" ("Jacques
Rivette's School For Actresses") will shortly be
available on home video.
David, Le Bande des Quatre is already out on DVD by Image.
Unfortunately, the copy isn't very good.
Filipe
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1357
From:
Date: Thu Aug 21, 2003 2:11am
Subject: Rivette
I thought The Nun (Jacques Rivette, 1965) was one of the most depressing,
repulsive, emotionally nightmarish films I've ever seen. Truly a round trip
through hell - perhaps my worst experience ever in a movie in my whole life. And I
managed to get strep throat during an endless screening of Celine et Julie Go
Boating. (The air conditioning in the theater might have more to do with this
than the movie). Still, the Rivette marathons recommended in other postings
sound like something I would not watch for a thousand dollars.
Couldn't we recommend something cheerier to movie newcomers? "Singin' in the
Rain'" is a film that makes everybody smile. It is worth a million Rivettes.
Mike Grost
1358
From:
Date: Thu Aug 21, 2003 2:25am
Subject: Re: Rivette
In a message dated 8/20/03 11:16:20 PM, MG4273@a... writes:
>Couldn't we recommend something cheerier to movie newcomers? "Singin' in
>the
>Rain'" is a film that makes everybody smile. It is worth a million Rivettes.
Well, I'm a Rivette partisan, Mike, but I'm also a "Singin' in the Rain"
partisan. I recently was able to see it projected on the big screen for the first
time and am more than ever convinced that the "Good Mornin'" sequence is even
greater than the title one. Magical filmmaking (but so is "Celine and
Julie"!)
Peter
http://hometown.aol.com/ptonguette/index.html
1359
From: jaketwilson
Date: Thu Aug 21, 2003 6:55am
Subject: Re: The Unanswered Question(s)
"hotlove666" wrote:
> I consider Kiarostami's "educational films" documentaries (the ones
> I've seen). For me an essay film has a narration by the filmmaker.
His film trying to get kids to brush their teeth has a narrator, and
locates itself undecidably between documentary and fiction -- though it
sure doesn't seem faked when the child star goes to the dentist and is
heard screaming and whimpering offscreen for a solid ten minutes. It's
really a showcase for the cruel side of Kiarostami's sensibility, which
is perhaps less overt in the recent features.
You can see
> something very much like Joyce's epiphanies in The Dubliners in
> K's "early, politcal ones," which I like a lot: Experience, The
> Traveller, the one about the husband who hits his wife (I forget the
> title). At the end of each, when the character has had a big defeat
> and suddenl;y sees himself in a clear but very cold light, K cuts to
> a high angle shot of him for the first time in the film.
I would love to see these -- Kiarostami recently came here to Melbourne
for the film festival but the organisers missed the chance to do a full
retrospective. One of the new films I liked best at the festival was
Jafar Panahi's Crimson Gold, which K scripted. I'm wondering if this
might be in a similar mode -- it certainly has a bleak political edge,
and takes a chilly 'objective' view of its downtrodden hero. Though I
think Panahi is good in his own right.
JTW
1360
From: Yoel Meranda
Date: Thu Aug 21, 2003 9:18am
Subject: Re: back to "genre" and "realism"
Fred,
I have to admit that the "big picture" is more complicated than I
made it seem like. I have to think about the issue a "little" more
and I have to see some great films so that I can make up my mind.
However, I really disagree when you write:
"And Yoel, the idea of "failure" is already inherent in Zach's
phrase, in the meaning(s) of the word "semblance." And I wouldn't
dismiss it as you do with "For me, the question always is what the
film does to you and not what it wants to do to you," because what a
film may "want" to do even while failing to do it is indeed a part of
what it actually does to you. There are many great films that are
partly about the failure of their own aspirations -- "Dog Star
Man"/"The Art of Vision" can be seen as a study in the failure of its
attempt to understand the universe through metaphor, for example."
Do you really believe that a film can be great if a director goes out
to shoot a totally realistic film without being consciously or
unconsciously aware that art is more complex than that? I know that
anything can be good in theory but I guess the real question
is: "Have you seen the shallowness of a director becoming a strength
of the film?"
There is a difference between making a film about the failure of its
own aspirations and making a film that fails in its aspirations. So
again, it is what it does to you, not what it wants to do to you.
Almost all of the greatest artworks that I know of have something in
them that admits their failures. They would not be so perfect if they
haven't.
Yoel
1361
From: Patrick Ciccone
Date: Thu Aug 21, 2003 0:22pm
Subject: Re: Ray and Television
Much better than the television in BIGGER THAN LIFE is the set placed
beneath the staircase of the Stark home in REBEL--it seems like the
key element of the decor and of many of the domestic Scope
composition, especially when its screen is filled with threatening static.
Also, for a very literal Ray frame-within-frame, there's the upside
entrance of Cottonmouth on the groundglass of a view camera in WIND
ACROSS THE EVERGLADES.
Patrick
1362
From: David Ehrenstein
Date: Thu Aug 21, 2003 1:59pm
Subject: Re: Rivette, Rohmer
Really? Well that's a shame -- and an increasingly
common problem. The DVD of Chereau's "L'Homme Blesse"
is just awful.
--- filipefurtado wrote:
> >I understand that"La bande des Quatre" ("Jacques
> Rivette's School For Actresses") will shortly be
> available on home video.
>
> David, Le Bande des Quatre is already out on DVD by
> Image.
> Unfortunately, the copy isn't very good.
>
>
> Filipe
>
>
> ---
> Acabe com aquelas janelinhas que pulam na sua tela.
> AntiPop-up UOL - É grátis!
> http://antipopup.uol.com.br
>
>
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1363
From: David Ehrenstein
Date: Thu Aug 21, 2003 2:00pm
Subject: Re: Rivette
Sounds like you'd prefer "Amelie."
If so, you're welcome to it.
--- MG4273@a... wrote:
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1364
From: Fred Camper
Date: Thu Aug 21, 2003 1:23pm
Subject: Re: Re: back to "genre" and "realism"
Yoel,
I really question how conscious all the directors of classical Hollywood
were of what I think they were "really: doing. Some were, such as Vidor,
but Hawks or Walsh? I have my doubts.
Hawks told an interviewer something like, "What I try to do is make two
or three good scenes and not annoy the audience for the rest of the
picture." That has always struck me because if I thought Hawks was a
terrible filmmaker I'm sure I would think of this as pretty good
evidence. It's a statement that goes against my whole idea of intensity
in art, and my whole experience of Hawks's films.
This isn't the same thing as saying that a filmmaker has tried to make a
"totally realistic film" and failed, but in a way it's close. We know
that artists aren't always aware of what they are doing, and this seems
to me to be especailly true in classical narrative cinema. I've read
statement by Mizoguchi that suggest he thinks the truth he's after has
to do with his characters, not with the "space."
But wait. You wrote:
"There is a difference between making a film about the failure of its
own aspirations and making a film that fails in its aspirations. So
again, it is what it does to you, not what it wants to do to you."
Well, now you're talking about what the film does, rather than what the director intends, and now I agree with you. I don't think a film that's trying to be escapist entertainment but has bad sets and wooden acting due to simple incompetence or lack of budget is doing anything like what Brakhage does when he makes films about the failure of metaphor, or like what Sirk does in compositions that seem to acknowledge their own theatrical artificiality.
"Almost all of the greatest artworks that I know of have something in
them that admits their failures." Well, yes. And Hawks's best films have something in almost every scene that is great, and goes way beyond not annoying the audience.
- Fred
1365
From: Fred Camper
Date: Thu Aug 21, 2003 3:51pm
Subject: Re: Re: John Hughes
Well, I guess I have to offer a somewhat mixed view of John Hughes.
He was passionate about cinema, and in a good way. He was a regular at
Howard and Roger's (see my post at
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/a_film_by/message/668 for info on Howard
and Roger), but for a while had the annoying habit of phoning about two
minutes before a film was scheduled to start saying he was nearby and
could they wait five minutes -- which usually became 15. They cured him
of that by no longer waiting.
He published, I believe co-authored with Tag Gallagher, a short
interview with Rossellini in the "Village Voice" that I thought was
terrific -- Rossellini talked about the "essential image," which I think
was in the article title. And when two rare Rossellinis -- Europe 51 and
Viva L'Italia! -- were showing in Washington, he expressed an interest
in going, and I borrowed a car and drove him and I think two other
people. This was around 1975, and while we were in Washington he wanted
to stop at the Watergate apartment-office complex, and went around
stopping pedestrians to ask where the site of the famous bugging was,
which I found mildly embarrassing, though there was certainly a good
reason to be interested. The films were unbelievably great, and I still
haven't been able to see "Viva L'Italia" again. When I'm incredibly
moved by a film, I usually just want to bask in its afterglow, but I
remember in the car trip back John kept trying to discuss the "Brechtian
lighting" in "Europa 51." I have to respect his energy in wanting to
discuss film, and like many of is in trying to figure it out.
- Fred
1366
From: vincent lobrutto
Date: Thu Aug 21, 2003 3:52pm
Subject: Re: Back to "genre" and "realism"
Fred,
I really admire that you had the courage to question the artistic intentions of Hawks and Walsh. I also think that Hawks was a less than great filmmaker when compared to contemporaries, John Ford, King Vidor, Alfred Hitchcock, and Orson Welles. Sarris' book and The Men Who Made The Movies along with many other factors made the important revelation that there were filmmakers in the Classical Hollywood system who want beyond factory product and created art. This was a good thing for film history but they quickly lost perspective. In the case of Hawks, Walsh and others, defenders focused on consistent themes in their work and the treatment of specific subjects and used a largely literary model to elevate these craftsmen with some artistic value to supreme artists. The line about making two or three great scenes has always offended my sensibilities also. It is my view that these men who were towards the end of their lives bought into all of the adulatation and ran with what the New
American generation of filmmakers and critics were saying about them and contributed to the myth. I always feel the committment to state that these directors did not work on their own - they had a vision, a story to tell but the contribution of the production designers, cinematographers, music, sound, editors and other craftspeople is enormous. Historically many critics like to downplay this contribution as window dressing but the fact is they helped to form and create the vision and were responsible for impacting on the narratives that have been disected for so many decades now. The director is the author of a film - their pallette is the film crafts but they relied on the contributions to comment and illustrate the concepts they wanted in the film in ways beyond the director's understanding in many cases.
Realism is in the mind of the filmmaker and the eye of the viewer. Cassavetes and Fosse were truth seekers one attempted realism by stripping away every Hollywood convention he could tear down and the other used the gloss of showbusiness to express his dark view. If you believe in the universe of a film it is successful and realistic regardless of whether it is The Battle of Algiers or Star Wars. To me Dog Star Man is a mythopoetic film that imparts the reality of the filmmaker that allows me to experience his reality. As to the notion of failure. There has never been or never will be a perfect film - these imperfections are part of the medium. No one sets out to make a falied film - take Ed Wood for example - he saw his work much differently than any fan or critic. What the filmmaker tells us is in the film and in the statements they make. This is valid on one level. The role of the critic for me is to expand and elaborate on what they understand the film to be based on history,
experience, context, circumstances and the study of visual storytelling and cinematic aesthetics. We should be careful of over interpreting and labeling issues such as realism but learn from the filmmakers who present reality as they see it to entertain us, enlighten and grow our experience of what the cinema can be. For me Singin' in The Rain is as valid as Rivette - each film has something to offer - we should recieve them in that spirit and never stop trying to understand this mysterious, magical and wonderous art.
Vinny LoBrutto
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1367
From:
Date: Thu Aug 21, 2003 3:56pm
Subject: 55 Recommended French Films
Lumière Brothers' First Films (Louis Lumière, 1895 - 1897) Compilation of 85 of the Brothers' best short films, each 50 seconds long.
Les Vampires (Louis Feuillade)
The Passion of Joan of Arc (Carl Theodore Dreyer)
Le Million (René Clair)
À Nous la liberté (René Clair)
La Kermesse héroique (Jacques Feyder)
L'Atalante (Jean Vigo)
Toni (Jean Renoir)
Grand Illusion (Jean Renoir)
Le Jour se lève (Marcel Carné)
La Règle du jeu / The Rules of the Game (Jean Renoir)
La Nuit Fantastique (Marcel L'Herbier)
Les enfants du paradis (Marcel Carné)
Journal d'un curé de campagne / Diary of a Country Priest (Robert Bresson)
La Ronde (Max Ophuls)
Madame de...(Max Ophuls)
Nuit et brouillard (Alain Resnais)
Lola Montès (Max Ophuls)
Un Condamné à mort s'est échappé/A Man Escaped (Robert Bresson)
Mon Oncle (Jacques Tati)
Hiroshima mon amour (Alain Resnais)
Plein Soleil/Purple Noon (René Clément)
Le Trou (Jacques Becker)
A bout de souffle / Breathless (Jean-Luc Godard)
Une femme est une femme / A Woman is a Woman (Jean-Luc Godard)
L'Année dernière à Marienbad / Last Year at Marienbad (Alain Resnais)
Cléo de 5 à 7 (Agnès Varda)
Le Mépris / Contempt (Jean-Luc Godard)
L'Homme de Rio / That Man from Rio (Philippe De Broca)
Pierrot le fou (Jean-Luc Godard)
La Prise du pouvoir par Louis XIV / The Rise of Louis XIV (Roberto Rossellini)
Belle de jour (Luis Buñuel)
Je t'aime, je t'aime (Alain Resnais)
Play Time (Jacques Tati)
Trafic (Jacques Tati)
Le Samouraï (Jean-Pierre Melville)
Tendre poulet / Dear Detective (Philippe De Broca)
Stavisky (Alain Resnais)
La Nuit américaine / Day For Night (François Truffaut)
Mon oncle d'Amérique (Alain Resnais)
Diva (Jean-Jacques Beineix)
La Nuit de Varennes (Ettore Scola)
Cyrano de Bergerac (Jean-Paul Rappenau)
Les Roseaux sauvages / Wild Reeds (André Téchiné)
Les Cent et une nuits de Simon Cinéma / The Hundred and One Nights (Agnès Varda)
Black Dju (Pol Cruchten)
Les Voleurs / Thieves (André Téchiné)
Ma Vie en rose (Alain Berliner)
Sucre amer / Bitter Sugar (Christian Lara)
The Chambermaid on the Titanic (Bigas Luna)
Beau Travail (Claire Denis)
Les Glaneurs et la glaneuse / The Gleaners and I (Agnès Varda)
Le Pacte des loups / The Brotherhood of the Wolf (Christophe Gans)
L'Homme du train / The Man on the Train (Patrice Leconte)
1368
From: Fred Camper
Date: Thu Aug 21, 2003 4:05pm
Subject: Re: Re: Back to "genre" and "realism"
Vinny,
Ah, but I *do* think Haws and Walsh were great artists. My point, in
response to Yoel, is that the greatness they produced may not have been
the result of conscious intentions on their part.
About failure, I think you may be missing what I was trying to get at.
Patrick Ciccone said it better than I did, in post 1286
(http://groups.yahoo.com/group/a_film_by/message/1286):
"....the failure of cinema to recreate reality or objects across time
(that is, cinema's failure to be a functioning time machine) is one of
the most poignant and sad themes in film, as evidenced in such great
works as VERTIGO, LA JETEE, LOLA MONTES, and so on."
It's not that the flashbacks in "Lola Montes" fail to make us feel the
illusion of living in the past with Lola, or that the circus stuff
"ruins" them -- it's that those effects are a large part of the movie's
point.
- Fred
1369
From: David Ehrenstein
Date: Thu Aug 21, 2003 4:17pm
Subject: Re: 55 Recommended French Films
You forgot the greatest of them all --
"Those Who Love Me Can Take the Train" (Patrice
Chereau)
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1370
From: Dan Sallitt
Date: Thu Aug 21, 2003 4:14pm
Subject: Re: Re: Back to "genre" and "realism"
> Sarris' book and The Men
> Who Made The Movies along with many other factors made the important
> revelation that there were filmmakers in the Classical Hollywood
> system who want beyond factory product and created art. This was a
> good thing for film history but they quickly lost perspective. In the
> case of Hawks, Walsh and others, defenders focused on consistent
> themes in their work and the treatment of specific subjects and used
> a largely literary model to elevate these craftsmen with some
> artistic value to supreme artists.
Liking or not liking Hawks is a matter of taste, but, historically
speaking, Hawks and Walsh did not ride on the coattails of the auteurist
reevaluation of Hollywood. Back in the 50s, the young Cahiers crowd
were dubbed "Hitchcocko-Hawksians" in honor of their two favorite
directors. Love of Hawks and Hitchcock came first, followed by the
politique, followed by Sarris, followed by any later loss of perspective
that might have occurred. You'd also have to put Walsh-mania near the
beginning of that timeline. - Dan
1371
From: Tristan
Date: Thu Aug 21, 2003 5:11pm
Subject: Re: 55 Recommended French Films
I'm not doing so good. I've only seen 19 out of those 55, and quite a
few Lumiere. Quite a few of those are difficult to find,
unfortunately. My question: what was good about Brotherhood of the
Wolf?
1372
From: hotlove666
Date: Thu Aug 21, 2003 5:17pm
Subject: Failure, Rivette
"One half of the meaning of poetry is the affective fallacy; one half
is the biographical fallacy, and the other half is the intentional
fallacy."
-- Harold Bloom on The New Criticism
The greatest poem about artistic failure: Browning's "Childe
Roland to the Dark Tower came," which inspired the ending of
2001.
A great film about artistic failure that I wish was more widely
available: Sirk's "Speak to Me like the Rain."
Mike - see "Haut bas fragile" before you give up on Rivette -
especially if you like "Singin'..."
1373
From: jaketwilson
Date: Thu Aug 21, 2003 5:29pm
Subject: Re: back to "genre" and "realism"
This question of intentionality gets tricky. I take it as axiomatic
that whenever a movie succeeds artistically, what we're responding to
has a lot of conscious thought and planning behind it -- it doesn't
just happen by some fluke.
But the bottom line is there's a gap between the kind of thinking that
goes into creating art, and the ability to describe this thinking later
in public. My guess that Hawks, say, wasn't too sure what he was doing
till he did it, and then wasn't too sure what he had done. Which is
pretty much the normal way people go about things, except he had a
special talent for coming up with good ideas from moment to moment.
In any case, is it meaningful to try and provide a single 'correct'
definition of Hawks' achievement? If we assume that the interesting
aspects of any movie can be validly described in multiple ways using
multiple vocabularies, it might be worth pondering what he was trying
to convey with his remark about aiming for 'two or three good scenes.'
Even if this doesn't seem like a persuasive description of Hawks' work
to us, presumably it meant something real to him as a description of
his working methods (unless he was just trying to bamboozle an
interviewer).
JTW
1374
From: Fred Camper
Date: Thu Aug 21, 2003 5:39pm
Subject: Re: Re: back to "genre" and "realism"; Hawks & Rossellini
jaketwilson wrote:
>
>In any case, is it meaningful to try and provide a single 'correct'
>definition of Hawks' achievement? If we assume that the interesting
>aspects of any movie can be validly described in multiple ways using
>multiple vocabularies, it might be worth pondering what he was trying
>to convey with his remark about aiming for 'two or three good scenes.'
>
>
Oh, sure. He probably meant something by it. I've just never found it
useful, but perhaps someone else can relate it to his films in an
interesting way. And of course there can be many definitions of Hawks's
achievement; different admirers of his work will offer different ones,
and one person might offer more than one. I *do* have the view that he
is far more profoundly a visual stylist than he's usually given credit for.
Rossellini has a version of the "few good" scenes statement in an old
interview, something to the effect that he makes films partly just to
make certain scenes, and he cites the fishing scene in "Stromboli" as an
example. With Rossellini I do understand it, because his films,
particularly pre-1968, seem to include moments of epiphany that the
films tend toward.
- Fred
1375
From:
Date: Thu Aug 21, 2003 6:13pm
Subject: The Brotherhood of the Wolf
There are lots of fun things about Wolf.
It has a well constructed mystery plot. What is going on in the French countryside? All sorts of locals have seen a monstrous creature, unknown to biology. The solution that gradually emerged was a big surprise.
The film has lots of exciting action scenes. These were fun the way Speed or Die Hard are fun.
I am a scientist, and have a weakness for movies with scientist heroes. I could fantasize along with the film, and pretend I was having all these adventures that the hero was having. After all, we are both scientists, and I am just as glamorous, brave, smart, romantic and clever at solving the mystery as he is. Aren't I? Well I could enjoy the fantasy for around two hours :)
The film has a delirious mix of genres – and for once, these are 1) consciously intended by the creators and 2) a reason for the film's success. What other film is a combination of
literary French historical film
karate movie
horror film
social commentary film
romance
look at Native Americans
traditional French Art Film
mystery movie
action drama
character driven film with the cream of young French actors
epic spectacle with lavish sets and costumes
satirical comedy
look at early science
At the risk of being too autobiographical, I like traditional movies!
I like pretending to have adventures. Speed (1994) really thrilled me, and I love John McTiernan.
I love mysteries.
I get the impression that filmgoers are now deeply split into two camps:
People who only like Hollywood.
People who only like the most serious art films.
The art film camp is full of people who genuinely seem to despise many traditional pleasures. They regard a movie with a mystery plot as some sort of horrid vulgarism that is an assault on serious art.
People have a RIGHT to these feelings.
If this is their genuine belief, they a have every right to enjoy films this way.
But I am built differently, inside.
I want to have fun at the movies.
Why cannot we like both art and Hollywood films, such as Miss Congeniality, Shanghai Noon, Shrek and Zoolander?
I do NOT want to see depressing films – hence the Dire Warning about Rivette.
I especially love musicals.
One of my all-time favorite films is Grease 2 (directed and choreographed by Patricia Birch).
And I love abstract films, such as Oskar Fischinger, Jordan Belson, James Whitney, Dwinnell Grant, late Brakhage, etc.
I love camera movement: Preminger, Ophuls, Resnais, Joseph H. Lewis, Siodmak, Sternberg, Mizoguchi, Dreyer.
1376
From: filipefurtado
Date: Thu Aug 21, 2003 6:29pm
Subject: Re: Re: Back to "genre" and "realism"
>
> Liking or not liking Hawks is a matter of taste, but, histor
ically
> speaking, Hawks and Walsh did not ride on the coattails of t
he auteurist
> reevaluation of Hollywood.
Walsh's career was always uneven, a masterpiece like Persued
one day, a nearly worthless film like Battle Cry in the
next,but even in the later we can find Walsh moments that
clearly belongs to the work of a major figure (like some of
the scnes with Aldo Ray in the farm).
Now, with Hawks, you can dislike him (as Dan puts it's a
matter of taste), but after seeing a random half a dozen of
his films (at least from A Girl on Every Port on) is hard to
deny the evidency of a remarkable consistence on his work.
Filipe
Back in the 50s, the young Cahiers crowd
> were dubbed "Hitchcocko-
Hawksians" in honor of their two favorite
> directors. Love of Hawks and Hitchcock came first, followed
by the
> politique, followed by Sarris, followed by any later loss of
perspective
> that might have occurred. You'd also have to put Walsh-
mania near the
> beginning of that timeline. - Dan
>
>
>
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1377
From: Dan Sallitt
Date: Thu Aug 21, 2003 6:42pm
Subject: Grease 2
> One of my all-time favorite films is Grease 2 (directed and choreographed by Patricia Birch).
I apologize for following up on your mention of GREASE 2 and passing
over all your other favorites.... I can't quite call this a favorite,
but I remember thinking that the direction was rather good - at the
time, I thought it far superior to Kleiser's work in GREASE, though over
the years I came to understand Kleiser more, and might (or might not) be
able to tolerate GREASE if I saw it now. Be that as it may, GREASE 2
was so roundly attacked that Patricia Birch's directing career was
effectively stopped. (Her only other credit in the IMDb is an exercise
video.)
I felt more or less the same way about CAN'T STOP THE MUSIC: the subject
matter was a bit difficult to work with, but I definitely thought that
Nancy Walker had something as a director. Once again: critical mockery
all around, and no more director credits for Walker.
I guess the reason I'm writing this is that I pride myself, as do all
auteurist types, I'm sure, on being able to spot interesting direction
in unlikely places. And yet, even among ourselves, there's absolutely
no consensus about which directors should be spotted and which
overlooked. It's odd that the act of director-spotting should seem so
concrete and objective in our minds - I didn't have the slightest doubt
when I spotted Birch and Walker, and I'm sure many of you know the
feeling - and yet that it should go so totally uncorroborated, even
among the like-minded. I suppose the most sensible explanation is that
we're talking about total subjectivity that merely feels like
objectivity. Yet I cling to my illusions still.... - Dan
1378
From: Dan Sallitt
Date: Thu Aug 21, 2003 6:45pm
Subject: Battle Cry
> Walsh's career was always uneven, a masterpiece like Persued
> one day, a nearly worthless film like Battle Cry in the
> next,but even in the later we can find Walsh moments that
> clearly belongs to the work of a major figure (like some of
> the scnes with Aldo Ray in the farm).
And there's always Dorothy Malone undressing in that armchair, one of
the more memorable images of the 50s. - Dan
1379
From: filipefurtado
Date: Thu Aug 21, 2003 6:38pm
Subject: Re: Re: back to "genre" and "realism"; Hawks & Rossellini
>
> Oh, sure. He probably meant something by it. I've just never
found it
> useful, but perhaps someone else can relate it to his films
in an
> interesting way.
I always link the phrase to the relaxed tone of his late
films, which I think is important to their achievements.
Filipe
And of course there can be many definitions of Hawks's
> achievement; different admirers of his work will offer diffe
rent ones,
> and one person might offer more than one. I *do* have the vi
ew that he
> is far more profoundly a visual stylist than he's usually gi
ven credit for.
>
> Rossellini has a version of the "few good" scenes statement
in an old
> interview, something to the effect that he makes films partl
y just to
> make certain scenes, and he cites the fishing scene in "Stro
mboli" as an
> example. With Rossellini I do understand it, because his fil
ms,
> particularly pre-
1968, seem to include moments of epiphany that the
> films tend toward.
>
> - Fred
>
>
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1380
From: Eric Henderson
Date: Thu Aug 21, 2003 7:10pm
Subject: Re: can't stop the music
> I felt more or less the same way about CAN'T STOP THE MUSIC: the subject
> matter was a bit difficult to work with, but I definitely thought that
> Nancy Walker had something as a director. Once again: critical mockery
> all around, and no more director credits for Walker.
I agree with you here. Walker was asked to walk a tough line between classic
Hollywood farce and underground camp (alright, the gap's not all that wide, at
least not anymore) and she has a knack for blocking her subjects in an
intriguing, bull-in-the-china-shop way. Now, if only she and her
cinematographer had reached some sort of understanding (esteemed Bill
Butler of Jaws, Lipstick, and Grease fame). A lot of good stuff is going on in
either arena, but rarely to the two of them seem to convene (musical numbers
are teeming with passively-framed establishing shots).
1381
From: David Ehrenstein
Date: Thu Aug 21, 2003 7:23pm
Subject: Re: Grease 2
"I felt more or less the same way about CAN'T STOP THE
MUSIC: the subject
matter was a bit difficult to work with, but I
definitely thought that
Nancy Walker had something as a director. Once again:
critical mockery
all around, and no more director credits for Walker."
It was a dishonest film about a dishonest group.
And did you know a "Grease 3" is in the works?
Kleiser isn't invoved and I don't believe Birch is
either.
--- Dan Sallitt wrote:
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1382
From: Eric Henderson
Date: Thu Aug 21, 2003 7:32pm
Subject: Re: (can't stop the dishonesty)
> It was a dishonest film about a dishonest group.
So one of them had an S&M number featuring women. At least the "YMCA"
number left very little to be doubted.
1383
From:
Date: Thu Aug 21, 2003 7:44pm
Subject: Re: Grease 2
Dan,
I am really grateful to get validation on Patricia Birch from a fellow auteurist, too!
She apparently has a long career as both a stage and screen choreographer. She did a music video for Cyndi Lauper, Money Changes Everything. This is the one in which Cyndi sailed out over the audience in a bucket. It is inoffensive, but shows little of the exuberance and stylishness of the choreography in Grease 2.
Birch was given a Thank You on In & Out. One suspects she has something to do with the scene in which the hero Listens to His Body and starts dancing.
And who can forget Tom Hanks dancing to Heart and Soul on the giant keyboard in Big?
Did not like Randal Kleiser's work in Grease, either. But felt Kleiser did better later with Getting It Right and It's My Party. Have not yet seen his recent work for TV.
Next, need to see Can't Stop the Music.
Mike Grost
1384
From: David Ehrenstein
Date: Thu Aug 21, 2003 7:38pm
Subject: Re: Re: (can't stop the dishonesty)
Subtext is never text.
--- Eric Henderson wrote:
> > It was a dishonest film about a dishonest group.
>
> So one of them had an S&M number featuring women. At
> least the "YMCA"
> number left very little to be doubted.
>
>
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1385
From: hotlove666
Date: Thu Aug 21, 2003 8:23pm
Subject: One, Two, Three
1. Very eloquent, Mike, and true as far as I'm concerned. I doubt
that you'll find many here who don't like a good night at the
movies - we wouldn't be Hollywood auteurists if we didn't. For the
record, the Cahiers endorsed Pact. Gans is a fellow critic, and
they also enjoy talking to him about new things like video games,
which he's heavily into, as they are. (PS - I'm not, but when I
interviewed Carpenter for the videogame issue, I learned that he
is. He loves Grand Theft Auto.) I liked Pact better than most
current H'wd equivalents - I haven't seen Necronomicon, but I'll
be curious to see what Gans has up his sleeve for a third
feature.
And pardon me if you've already addressed this, but what did you
think of Identity? I love a mystery, too, as you know, and I'm very
interested in the writer of that one, as well as liking everything by
the director. You might take a look at S/Z, by R. Barthes, which
analyzes the role of mystery plotting - what he calls the
hermeneutic code - in traditional narratives. It should be part of
every screenwriting class. Hitchcock and Polanksi construct
every scene as a mini-heremenutic code - like the opening of
Frantic, which is shots from inside a taxi coming from the airport
to...where? At the end of the sequence a garbage truck at the end
of a street perspective moves out of a shot and we see a little
Eiffel Tower off in the distance. (Then at the end we see a little
Statue of Liberty...)
2. I loved Battle Cry when I saw it at MOMA many years ago
(probably with John Hughes). Walsh's post-WWII films pose one
set of problems, as do his post-Code films - the latter restricted
him, and the former soured him. It helps to see the postwar films
in particular in the context of the whole filmography. But I even
liked Marines, Let's Go. In fact, I wouldn't mind seeing A Private's
Affair again!
3. Hawks rules. One of his indifferent scenes is worth 20 by
most filmmakers.
1386
From: Patrick Ciccone
Date: Thu Aug 21, 2003 9:00pm
Subject: Videogames, Sokurov, Dwan
--- In a_film_by@yahoogroups.com, "hotlove666"
wrote:
> Gans is a fellow critic, and
> they also enjoy talking to him about new things like video games,
> which he's heavily into, as they are. (PS - I'm not, but when I
> interviewed Carpenter for the videogame issue, I learned that he
> is. He loves Grand Theft Auto.) I liked Pact better than most
> current H'wd equivalents - I haven't seen Necronomicon, but I'll
> be curious to see what Gans has up his sleeve for a third
> feature.
By the way, since I forgot to mention RUSSIAN ARK, the ultimate
attempt at a cinematic time machine, a few posts back, I might as
well throw out that the film also seems not unrelated to a videogame
a la Grand Theft Auto, albeit a malfunctioning version--that is,
navigating a character in continuous real time without any edits.
But time doesn't work in Sokurov the way it would in a video game,
and the camera (despite its technical mastery) or the Stranger are
never able to integrate into something that can actually take control
of the game (history).
Also, speaking of video games and films, the super-long sideways
track through the town following the fleeing John Payne in Dwan's
SILVER LODE seems to anticipate video games before they were even
created.
Patrick
1387
From: Patrick Ciccone
Date: Thu Aug 21, 2003 9:15pm
Subject: Black and white Scope
I caught the Losey oddity THESE ARE THE DAMNED yesterday, and
afterward was mentally trying to compile a list of great b&w Scope
films--this is what I could come up with off the top of my head, in
relative order of preference:
BUNNY LAKE IS MISSING
BITTER VICTORY
THE TARNISHED ANGELS
HAMLET (Kozintsev)
BRANDED TO KILL
THESE ARE THE DAMNED
THE 400 BLOWS
FORTY GUNS
JULES ET JIM
don't know if these are as good as any of the above:
ENJO, FIRES ON THE PLAIN (both Ichikawa), SHOOT THE PIANO PLAYER.
I dislike MANHATTAN, and I haven't seen ANDREI RUBLEV, THE
PORNOGRAPHERS, THE HUSTLER, any of the Scope Kurosawa films, or
JAILHOUSE ROCK for the matter. Am I forgetting anything major to
watch out for? This seems like a pretty rich sub-genre of filmmaking-
-I wish it was attempted more often.
Patrick
1388
From: David Ehrenstein
Date: Thu Aug 21, 2003 9:24pm
Subject: Re: Black and white Scope
Demy's "Lola"
Jansco's "The Red and the White"
Truffaut's "Jules et Jim"
Has' "The Saragossa Manuscript"
--- Patrick Ciccone wrote:
> I caught the Losey oddity THESE ARE THE DAMNED
> yesterday, and
> afterward was mentally trying to compile a list of
> great b&w Scope
> films--this is what I could come up with off the top
> of my head, in
> relative order of preference:
>
> BUNNY LAKE IS MISSING
> BITTER VICTORY
> THE TARNISHED ANGELS
> HAMLET (Kozintsev)
> BRANDED TO KILL
> THESE ARE THE DAMNED
> THE 400 BLOWS
> FORTY GUNS
> JULES ET JIM
>
> don't know if these are as good as any of the above:
>
> ENJO, FIRES ON THE PLAIN (both Ichikawa), SHOOT THE
> PIANO PLAYER.
>
> I dislike MANHATTAN, and I haven't seen ANDREI
> RUBLEV, THE
> PORNOGRAPHERS, THE HUSTLER, any of the Scope
> Kurosawa films, or
> JAILHOUSE ROCK for the matter. Am I forgetting
> anything major to
> watch out for? This seems like a pretty rich
> sub-genre of filmmaking-
> -I wish it was attempted more often.
>
> Patrick
>
>
>
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1389
From: George Robinson
Date: Thu Aug 21, 2003 9:30pm
Subject: Re: Black and white Scope
David E already mentioned The Red and the White, but isn't The Roundup also b&w 'scope?
Also, the great Kobayashi films Hara-Kiri and Rebellion, Kurosawa's High and Low (and several others not as good).
Aren't there also a couple of Godards? I don't have a reference book at hand, I'm just plucking at my memory.
George (going off half-plucked) Robinson
Alas, where is human nature so
weak as in a bookstore?
-Henry Ward Beecher
----- Original Message -----
From: Patrick Ciccone
To: a_film_by@yahoogroups.com
Sent: Thursday, August 21, 2003 5:15 PM
Subject: [a_film_by] Black and white Scope
I caught the Losey oddity THESE ARE THE DAMNED yesterday, and
afterward was mentally trying to compile a list of great b&w Scope
films--this is what I could come up with off the top of my head, in
relative order of preference:
BUNNY LAKE IS MISSING
BITTER VICTORY
THE TARNISHED ANGELS
HAMLET (Kozintsev)
BRANDED TO KILL
THESE ARE THE DAMNED
THE 400 BLOWS
FORTY GUNS
JULES ET JIM
don't know if these are as good as any of the above:
ENJO, FIRES ON THE PLAIN (both Ichikawa), SHOOT THE PIANO PLAYER.
I dislike MANHATTAN, and I haven't seen ANDREI RUBLEV, THE
PORNOGRAPHERS, THE HUSTLER, any of the Scope Kurosawa films, or
JAILHOUSE ROCK for the matter. Am I forgetting anything major to
watch out for? This seems like a pretty rich sub-genre of filmmaking-
-I wish it was attempted more often.
Patrick
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[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
1390
From: George Robinson
Date: Thu Aug 21, 2003 9:37pm
Subject: Re: Black and white Scope
I've got a few more -- and you're right, this is fascinating stuff.
Advise and Consent
The Court-Martial of Billy Mitchell (Preminger seems to have had a real affinity for this combination)
While the City Sleeps (a personal favorite of mine; it was shot in "Superscope" a process I know nothing about, and I've seen it projected "flat" with no apparent loss -- can anyone enlighten me?)
There are many Japanese B&W scope films; I wonder if the possible explanation for this is that the anamorphic frame resembles the scroll painting's aspect ratio and therefore is less of a cultural oddity for a Japanese visual artist than it seemed to be for Americans. (Remember how much Lang, Ford, Hawks and others complained about the long, narrow image. I believe it was Ford who said it was nothing like Western mural painting and he just couldn't compose for it.)
George Robinson
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
1391
From: Patrick Ciccone
Date: Thu Aug 21, 2003 9:43pm
Subject: Re: Black and white Scope
I thought there were more Preminger, just didn't, but I can't believe
I blanked on LOLA, which is great.
As for the Lang, I've seen it in France at 1.33--I can't imagine a
Scope frame being cropped from that. But Siegel's INVASION OF THE
BODY SNATCHERS, another I forgot, is also either Techniscope or
Superscope, and is always shown wide.
PWC
--- In a_film_by@yahoogroups.com, "George Robinson"
wrote:
> I've got a few more -- and you're right, this is fascinating stuff.
>
> Advise and Consent
> The Court-Martial of Billy Mitchell (Preminger seems to have had a
real affinity for this combination)
>
> While the City Sleeps (a personal favorite of mine; it was shot
in "Superscope" a process I know nothing about, and I've seen it
projected "flat" with no apparent loss -- can anyone enlighten me?)
>
> There are many Japanese B&W scope films; I wonder if the possible
explanation for this is that the anamorphic frame resembles the
scroll painting's aspect ratio and therefore is less of a cultural
oddity for a Japanese visual artist than it seemed to be for
Americans. (Remember how much Lang, Ford, Hawks and others complained
about the long, narrow image. I believe it was Ford who said it was
nothing like Western mural painting and he just couldn't compose for
it.)
>
> George Robinson
>
>
>
> [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
1392
From:
Date: Thu Aug 21, 2003 5:45pm
Subject: Re: Black and white Scope
"In Harm's Way" is another great one from Preminger. I also think of Jack
Clayton's "The Innocents" in addition to others already named. I think
Clayton's a pretty underrated guy anyway, so I take any opportunity to mention him.
Peter
http://hometown.aol.com/ptonguette/index.html
1393
From: hotlove666
Date: Thu Aug 21, 2003 10:28pm
Subject: Silver Lode
Patrick,
I'm sure Dwan would have DESIGNED videogames if he'd lived
long enough.
That track through the town is remarkable because much of the
film is about going back and forth between a flat town (a la a
western set) and a town with depth. The flat image is used to
graph changes in the political situation by the placement of
characters. Then all of a sudden you'll get shots that play against
that, like the last shot through the window, or the tracking shot
you refer to, or the high angle shot of the funeral. I like Silver
Lode best of all the Bogeaus films by Dwan.
1394
From: George Robinson
Date: Thu Aug 21, 2003 9:27pm
Subject: Re: Videogames, Sokurov, Dwan
I don't know about videogames but I'm delighted to see both that tracking shot -- a master stroke of both concision and analysis -- and that film mentioned. Another great underrated '50s western.
Incidentally, I'm surprised no one has ever remarked on the similarity in trajectory of the careers of John Payne and Dick Powell, the movement from crooner to tough guy. The big difference, of course, is that while Powell had a lot better material as a singer at Warners (Dubin and Warren wrote some great songs for the Berkeley musicals), Payne is a hell of a lot more convincing as a badass and is in a lot more good films in the second half of his career. And, of course, he never tried directing, so we don't know if he could have equalled the sheer grotesque lunacy of The Conqueror.
George (something of a sheer lunatic himself) Robinson
Alas, where is human nature so
weak as in a bookstore?
-Henry Ward Beecher
----- Original Message -----
From: Patrick Ciccone
To: a_film_by@yahoogroups.com
Sent: Thursday, August 21, 2003 5:00 PM
Subject: [a_film_by] Videogames, Sokurov, Dwan
--- In a_film_by@yahoogroups.com, "hotlove666"
wrote:
> Gans is a fellow critic, and
> they also enjoy talking to him about new things like video games,
> which he's heavily into, as they are. (PS - I'm not, but when I
> interviewed Carpenter for the videogame issue, I learned that he
> is. He loves Grand Theft Auto.) I liked Pact better than most
> current H'wd equivalents - I haven't seen Necronomicon, but I'll
> be curious to see what Gans has up his sleeve for a third
> feature.
By the way, since I forgot to mention RUSSIAN ARK, the ultimate
attempt at a cinematic time machine, a few posts back, I might as
well throw out that the film also seems not unrelated to a videogame
a la Grand Theft Auto, albeit a malfunctioning version--that is,
navigating a character in continuous real time without any edits.
But time doesn't work in Sokurov the way it would in a video game,
and the camera (despite its technical mastery) or the Stranger are
never able to integrate into something that can actually take control
of the game (history).
Also, speaking of video games and films, the super-long sideways
track through the town following the fleeing John Payne in Dwan's
SILVER LODE seems to anticipate video games before they were even
created.
Patrick
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1395
From: hotlove666
Date: Thu Aug 21, 2003 10:33pm
Subject: Black and White 'Scope
The Siberian Lady Macbeth
Bologna did a series of 'Scope b&w this summer. So did the LA
County Museum, in a more modest way.
1396
From: jess_l_amortell
Date: Thu Aug 21, 2003 10:39pm
Subject: Re: Black and white Scope
--- In a_film_by@yahoogroups.com, "George Robinson" wrote:
> Advise and Consent
> The Court-Martial of Billy Mitchell (Preminger seems to have had a real affinity for this combination)
Also the framing sequences of Bonjour Tristesse.
> While the City Sleeps (a personal favorite of mine; it was shot in "Superscope" a process I know nothing about, and I've seen it projected "flat" with no apparent loss -- can anyone enlighten me?)
RKO's SuperScope was 2:1, taken from a standard frame. (There's an explanation -- whose accuracy someone else will have to vouch for -- at http://www.widescreenmuseum.com/widescreen/wingss2.htm .) I've also seen the Lang at Academy ratio with what seemed like slightly extraneous space above & below.
1397
From: David Ehrenstein
Date: Thu Aug 21, 2003 10:48pm
Subject: Re: Black and white Scope
Yes "The Round-Up" is in scope as is "Silence and
Cry."
All of the episodes of "The Seven Capital Sins" are in
scope -- Godard's included.
"Le Grand Escroc" is also in scope.
--- George Robinson wrote:
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1398
From: Damien Bona
Date: Thu Aug 21, 2003 11:35pm
Subject: Re: Back to "genre" and "realism"
I think Hawks's line, "What I try to do is make two or three good
scenes and not annoy the audience for the rest of the picture" is an
example of the validity of the old cliché, "Trust the art, not the
artist." I always assumed Hawks was speaking tongue-in-cheek here,
but in any case the evidence is up there on the screen and you'd lose
track trying to count all the "good scenes" in a Hawks picture (and I
don't even count Hawks among my favorite directors).
I watched Jean Negulesco's wonderful Humoresque last night and the
great Oscar Levant had a speech which, although it was specifically
addressing musicians, seems to me to define what auteurism is all
about: "The whole point to me about an artist is the sound he
makes. A personal sound. It's his own sound like no one else in the
whole world . . . That's what's communicated between an artist and
his audience. That's what you call personality. If he's got that,
nothing else matters very much. If he doesn't, he might as well
quit."
Vinny Lobrutto wrote "If you believe in the universe of a film
it is successful and realistic regardless of whether it is The Battle
of Algiers or Star Wars."
I think you nailed it, Vinny, and this is as good a one-sentence
summation of film art as I've seen (I just wouldn't have used Star
Wars as an example).
Mike Grost wrote, "I love camera movement." I don't think one can
say camera movement is inherently a positive attribute. Ophuls's
tracking shots are wondrous to behold, but John Guillerman's pans and
Kevin Costner's inability to hold his camera motionless for more than
a few seconds in Open Range are not so good.
1399
From: George Robinson
Date: Thu Aug 21, 2003 9:22pm
Subject: Re: One, Two, Three
I share your enthusiasm for Battle Cry; it makes an interesting bookend with The Naked and the Dead. (although when Ira Hozinsky and I interviewed Walsh, he said the censors savaged the film, "They took out the naked and left only the dead.")
I don't think I'd be bold enough to defend Marines Let's Go or A Private's Affair. Perhaps the trick is to avoid Walsh films with apostrophes in their titles.
On the other hand, I think The Tall Men is one of the most underrated of all the great 50s westerns, and Walsh uses the 'scope frame brilliantly to show Gable's slowly growing alienation and isolation from community. (It also has one of the great opening lines in American film; Gable and Cameron Mitchell have been riding for what seems like an eternity under the credits. They finally come upon a frozen landscape at the center of which is a corpse hanging from a tree on which it has been lynched. Gable narrows his eyes and says, "Looks like we're getting close to civilization.")
As for Hawks's indifferent scenes, I can think of one of two films I would hesitate to speak up for -- Today We Live is pretty dire.
George Robinson
Alas, where is human nature so
weak as in a bookstore?
-Henry Ward Beecher
----- Original Message -----
From: hotlove666
To: a_film_by@yahoogroups.com
Sent: Thursday, August 21, 2003 4:23 PM
Subject: [a_film_by] One, Two, Three
1. Very eloquent, Mike, and true as far as I'm concerned. I doubt
that you'll find many here who don't like a good night at the
movies - we wouldn't be Hollywood auteurists if we didn't. For the
record, the Cahiers endorsed Pact. Gans is a fellow critic, and
they also enjoy talking to him about new things like video games,
which he's heavily into, as they are. (PS - I'm not, but when I
interviewed Carpenter for the videogame issue, I learned that he
is. He loves Grand Theft Auto.) I liked Pact better than most
current H'wd equivalents - I haven't seen Necronomicon, but I'll
be curious to see what Gans has up his sleeve for a third
feature.
And pardon me if you've already addressed this, but what did you
think of Identity? I love a mystery, too, as you know, and I'm very
interested in the writer of that one, as well as liking everything by
the director. You might take a look at S/Z, by R. Barthes, which
analyzes the role of mystery plotting - what he calls the
hermeneutic code - in traditional narratives. It should be part of
every screenwriting class. Hitchcock and Polanksi construct
every scene as a mini-heremenutic code - like the opening of
Frantic, which is shots from inside a taxi coming from the airport
to...where? At the end of the sequence a garbage truck at the end
of a street perspective moves out of a shot and we see a little
Eiffel Tower off in the distance. (Then at the end we see a little
Statue of Liberty...)
2. I loved Battle Cry when I saw it at MOMA many years ago
(probably with John Hughes). Walsh's post-WWII films pose one
set of problems, as do his post-Code films - the latter restricted
him, and the former soured him. It helps to see the postwar films
in particular in the context of the whole filmography. But I even
liked Marines, Let's Go. In fact, I wouldn't mind seeing A Private's
Affair again!
3. Hawks rules. One of his indifferent scenes is worth 20 by
most filmmakers.
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[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
1400
From:
Date: Thu Aug 21, 2003 8:10pm
Subject: Scope
Black and White Scope:
Two of my favorite movies:
Last Year at Marienbad
L'avventura (and other Antonioni)
You can watch both of these again and again, and they always seem visually
amazing.
You mentioned Kurosawa. High and Low is especially well composed in wide
screen.
Fritz Lang: Widescreen is "only good for funerals and snakes"!
Mike Grost
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