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Posts From the Internet Film Discussion Group, a_film_by
This group is dedicated to discussing film as art
from an auteurist perspective. The index to these files of posts can be found at http://www.fredcamper.com/afilmby/ The purpose of these files is to make our posts more accessible, for downloading and reading and to search engines.
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emailing them from that Web site.
10401
From: David Ehrenstein
Date: Sun May 30, 2004 6:27pm
Subject: Re: Re: Bill/Paul praised! Rockism in film? Seth welcomed!
I've hestiated joining this partcular discussion for
awhilebecause Meltzer used to be a very close friend
of mine. (I haven't seen him for 12 years.) But the
"Almost Famous" piece is very funny, particularly for
the bit about Jackson Browne, who another (non-famous)
ex-friend used to call "Garbo." Back in the day Browne
was a hanger-on at John Phillip Law's place on Miller
Drive (a scene written about extensively by Bill reed
in his memoir "Early Plastic.)
It was rather distressing to see a "60 Minutes" piece
on Browne, hailing him a representative of the "common
man." Oh yeah, the "common man" lost his cherry to
Nico at 15!
Sorry, but I can't say I can so much as STAND
Cristgau.
As bad as film criticism often gets ( eg. Richard
Roeper, Elvis Mitchell, Michael Medved) it rarely
reaches the depths of the music press.
Meltzer for all intents and purposes invented rock
criticism with his "The Aesthetics of Rock" (Something
Else? Press, 1970) which was at heart nothing more
than a thesis paper for his philosophy class at
Stoneybrook. For a brief moment he had a shot at
becoming the American Derrida. But that moment passed,
and with it much of what made Richard tolerable as a
person.
Richard can be spoted as an extra lining up for
Ramones tickets in "Rock 'n Roll High School."
--- Dave Garrett wrote:
> --- In a_film_by@yahoogroups.com, "hotlove666"
> wrote:
>
> > I also
> > note that Meltzer's writing has become kind of
> routine and futile,
> > but I liked his millennial blast at rock crit (and
> Almost Famous) in
> > the Chicago Reader.
>
> That piece appears to be only accessible at the
> Reader's website
> for a nominal cost, but I also found a copy of it
> here:
>
>
http://condor.depaul.edu/~dweinste/rock/meltzer-afrev.html
>
> Dave
>
>
>
>
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10402
From: jess_l_amortell
Date: Sun May 30, 2004 8:02pm
Subject: Re: Rockism explained! Kael mentioned!
--- In a_film_by@yahoogroups.com, "hotlove666" wrote:
> Not since Walter Kaufmann,
> > that beacon of our Frankie Avalon years, has a rock critic promoted
> > himself with such assiduous indirection.
>
> Great writing right there! I assume he isn't comparing Meltzer to
> Walter Kaufman, the popularizer who brilliantly introduced some of us
> to Hegel, Nietzsche and Existentialism a million years ago. Is there
> really a rock critic named Walter Kaufman????
I always thought that rock criticism was invented, or at least initiated, in the U.S. at least, by Meltzer, Sandy Pearlman, editor Paul Williams and others
in the original Crawdaddy magazine -- the Cahiers of rock? -- from 1966. (Although I wonder if any plausible precursors, probably not including Kaufmann,
have emerged; were there no reviews of Presley records, say, on any level, in the '50s?) Shortly thereafter came Bob Christgau and others, Christgau
developing what probably *could* be called a more Kael-like approach (the "Consumer Guide"). It's interesting, I think, that that was a time when rock, for
all its popularity and impact, was not yet reviewed in the New York Times for example (the kids were on their own), so whatever artistry it contained was
subterranean and unrecognized in a sense, perhaps not unlike that of some of the American auteurs (even though cinema as such was, of course, widely
reviewed).
10404
From: Paul Gallagher
Date: Sun May 30, 2004 8:42pm
Subject: Re: Bill/Paul praised! Rockism in film? Seth welcomed!
--- In a_film_by@yahoogroups.com, "hotlove666" wrote:
> Again, all very interesting, and I agree with you. I don't know how
> old you ar, Paul, but there actually was a time when film directors
> got some of the attention rock gods do. If Other Side of the Wind is
> ever finished, people will be puzzled by that aspect of it.
I'm 39. My interest in the cinema dates back to 1980 or so.
Now that I think about it, I haven't been especially interested in
film directors' personal lives, even though I like celebrity
gossip. I remember how a friend in the mid-1980's was disturbed and
disillusioned by the unflattering portrayal of Hitchcock in Donald
Spoto's _The Dark Side of Genius_. I didn't understand why such
gossip should matter, and in fact I've never been curious enough
even to look at that book. (The friend also revered Woody Allen -- I
wonder how he reacted to Soon Yi?)
I may be different now -- when I spoke to Colin MacCabe at a
book signing, my first question was whether Godard was impotent
as a result of his 1972 motorcycle accident. I've become
more prurient in my dotage.
As to celebrity status, I thought of Jim Jarmusch's recent _Coffee
and Cigarettes_, which contains a wonderful scene devoted to exploring
celebrity pecking orders. I spotted Jarmusch recently when I went
to a party in honor of Traci Lords. Jarmusch showed up to pay
homage to her. So it seems in the celebrity hierarchy, Jarmusch is
below Traci Lords...
Paul
10405
From: David Ehrenstein
Date: Sun May 30, 2004 8:53pm
Subject: Re: Re: Bill/Paul praised! Rockism in film? Seth welcomed!
--- Paul Gallagher wrote:
>
> I may be different now -- when I spoke to Colin
> MacCabe at a
> book signing, my first question was whether Godard
> was impotent
> as a result of his 1972 motorcycle accident. I've
> become
> more prurient in my dotage.
>
AND?!?!!!????!!!!
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10406
From: Fred Camper
Date: Sun May 30, 2004 9:50pm
Subject: Re: Gehr movie online
Andy Rector wrote:
>....the only Gehr movie
>posted online that I know of:
>http://www.viennale.at/english/trailer/ .
>
Thanks for posting this Though the page says 35mm, the original image
was digital video. This may in fact be the only Gehr work it makes sense
to post online. Even in the online version, it seems to me that it's
really good, involving the viewer in the kind of self-awareness of his
own perception of the piece that is characteristic of all Gehr's work.
But it might be better appreciated after first seeing the films on film
(and they do not translate to video, and Gehr has never authorized video
transfers).
I have a small page of Gehr links at
http://www.fredcamper.com/Film/GehrL.html ; corrections and additions
welcome.
I'm planning to use our group's first anniversary to put up some new
stills from a different filmmaker, though past homepage pictures will
remain available in the files section. But how else should we celebrate
June 13th? Perhaps a wild free for all party in chat with David and JPC
and Bill K and all of our chattiest members going at it at once?
- Fred C.
10407
From: Paul Gallagher
Date: Sun May 30, 2004 10:46pm
Subject: Re: Bill/Paul praised! Rockism in film? Seth welcomed!
> > I may be different now -- when I spoke to Colin
> > MacCabe at a
> > book signing, my first question was whether Godard
> > was impotent
> > as a result of his 1972 motorcycle accident.
> >
> AND?!?!!!????!!!!
>
Sorry to keep people hanging! He said he had heard that
rumor, but as far as he could tell, it wasn't true.
By the way -- in _Meeting WA_, Godard told Woody Allen
that he wondered whether all his video equipment was affecting
his potency. Maybe he was speaking metaphorically. If not I
suppose this implies his potency was OK before then. Or maybe
he was confusing impotency with sterility -- maybe he was
trying to have a child... Maybe not -- a few years earlier
he had this conversation with Manu Bonmariage:
M.B. -- You don't have any children?
J.L.G. -- I don't think so. You can't do both.
-- Bring up a child and make films?
- Even make a child. You can't do both. A film is too close.
-- Too close to a child?
- To life. You only have one life, and films are as close to it as you
get.
When I was in college, some friends who had never seen _Sauve
qui peut_ has still heard about the scene with the cows. I told
Colin MacCabe they asked what the director's sex life could
possibly be like. He told me that Godard told him he had tried
most of the things in the film. That surprised me, since they're
shown as so joyless in the film.
Paul
10408
From: jpcoursodon
Date: Sun May 30, 2004 11:53pm
Subject: Re: Bill/Paul praised! Rockism in film? Seth welcomed!
--- In a_film_by@yahoogroups.com, "Paul Gallagher"
wrote:
> > > I may be different now -- when I spoke to Colin
> > > MacCabe at a
> > > book signing, my first question was whether Godard
> > > was impotent
> > > as a result of his 1972 motorcycle accident.
> > >
> > AND?!?!!!????!!!!
> >
>
> Sorry to keep people hanging! He said he had heard that
> rumor, but as far as he could tell, it wasn't true.
>
"as far as he could tell" is a very ambiguous phrase. How far
could he tell?
Anyway, since JLG is pushing 75, the matter may no longer be of
such potent interest.
(I apologize to all virile septuagenarians in this Group. With
Viagra everything is possible these days).
> M.B. -- You don't have any children?
> J.L.G. -- I don't think so. You can't do both.
JLG famously said: "Mes films sont mes enfants." (or was it "Mes
enfants sont mes films"?)
10409
From: David Ehrenstein
Date: Mon May 31, 2004 0:47am
Subject: Re: Re: Bill/Paul praised! Rockism in film? Seth welcomed!
I recall an interview with Anna Karina a number of
years ago in Warhol's"Inter/View" magazine where she
spoke of Godard warmly and was in some distress over
the accident because "he has such a beautiful body."
This was a great shock to me as I've never so much as
a imagined much less seen "the goods." But I always
take Anna Karina's word for everything.
--- jpcoursodon wrote:
>
> "as far as he could tell" is a very ambiguous
> phrase. How far
> could he tell?
> Anyway, since JLG is pushing 75, the matter may
> no longer be of
> such potent interest.
> (I apologize to all virile septuagenarians in
> this Group. With
> Viagra everything is possible these days).
>
> > M.B. -- You don't have any children?
> > J.L.G. -- I don't think so. You can't do both.
>
>
> JLG famously said: "Mes films sont mes enfants."
> (or was it "Mes
> enfants sont mes films"?)
>
>
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10410
From: jpcoursodon
Date: Mon May 31, 2004 1:06am
Subject: Re: Bill/Paul praised! Rockism in film? Seth welcomed!
--- In a_film_by@yahoogroups.com, David Ehrenstein
wrote:
But I always
> take Anna Karina's word for everything.
>
Why would you take anybody's word -- especially AK's -- for
everything?
> --- jpcoursodon wrote:
>
> >
> > "as far as he could tell" is a very ambiguous
> > phrase. How far
> > could he tell?
> > Anyway, since JLG is pushing 75, the matter may
> > no longer be of
> > such potent interest.
> > (I apologize to all virile septuagenarians in
> > this Group. With
> > Viagra everything is possible these days).
> >
> > > M.B. -- You don't have any children?
> > > J.L.G. -- I don't think so. You can't do both.
> >
> >
> > JLG famously said: "Mes films sont mes enfants."
> > (or was it "Mes
> > enfants sont mes films"?)
> >
> >
>
>
>
>
>
> __________________________________
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10411
From: Craig Keller
Date: Mon May 31, 2004 3:28am
Subject: Jean-Luc Godard, imagined naked.
>I recall an interview with Anna Karina a number of
>years ago in Warhol's"Inter/View" magazine where she
>spoke of Godard warmly and was in some distress over
>the accident because "he has such a beautiful body."
>
>This was a great shock to me as I've never so much as
>a imagined much less seen "the goods." But I always
>take Anna Karina's word for everything.
In the interview with her in the Cahiers "Spécial Godard" from 1990 or 1991, she states that he has/had a very athletic build, but you wouldn't know it --
until once those clothes came off! (I paraphrase, of course.) And that once, in a fit of rage on a set, he picked up a crew-member, bodily, and threw him
several feet.
craig.
10412
From: David Ehrenstein
Date: Mon May 31, 2004 3:34am
Subject: Re: Re: Bill/Paul praised! Rockism in film? Seth welcomed!
--- jpcoursodon wrote:
> Why would you take anybody's word -- especially
> AK's -- for
> everything?
>
Oh Tut-Tut, J-P. She is a Goddess! One of my very
favorite film stars. I adore her. Right next to Julie
Christie.
And frankly don't you wish Julie Christie were
President of the United States instead of the Beyond
Loathesome Bush?
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10413
From: Noel Vera
Date: Mon May 31, 2004 5:15am
Subject: Re: Richter, Kael, Sontag
> > Is this California or Conneticut?
>
> The one neither of us is sure how to spell!
Ach. And there are fifty of your states to keep in
mind--
For the record, I think Kael is enjoyable if you
happen to enjoy meanness. As for Sontag's
tastes--well, she grandly condescends to the genre of
SF films, that's not something that would endear her
to me.
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10414
From: hotlove666
Date: Mon May 31, 2004 5:26am
Subject: Re: Bill/Paul praised! Rockism in film? Seth welcomed!
>
> When I was in college, some friends who had never seen _Sauve
> qui peut_ has still heard about the scene with the cows. I told
> Colin MacCabe they asked what the director's sex life could
> possibly be like. He told me that Godard told him he had tried
> most of the things in the film. That surprised me, since they're
> shown as so joyless in the film.
>
> Paul
He was a customer at Madame Claude's when I met him - he was working
on Tour Detour at that point. According to my informant at the time
his way of using the gals from MC was funnier than the assembly line
organized by the Kurtz character in Sauve qui peut, and marginally
more humane. But that scene is him, basically.
10415
From: hotlove666
Date: Mon May 31, 2004 5:30am
Subject: Re: Jean-Luc Godard, imagined naked.
>
> In the interview with her in the Cahiers "Spécial Godard" from 1990
or 1991, she states that he has/had a very athletic build,
And when I met her at the premier party for La grande bouffe in NY
and I expressed concern about the accident, she said he was very
atheletic and strong, so maybe he could get over it. Watching him
play tennis in Soft and Hard, I'd say he did. AK and I shook hands,
and it was weeks before I could bring myself to wash mine.
10416
From: hotlove666
Date: Mon May 31, 2004 5:34am
Subject: Re: Richter, Kael, Sontag
As for Sontag's
> tastes--well, she grandly condescends to the genre of
> SF films, that's not something that would endear her
> to me.
The Imagination of Disaster, reprinted in The Science Fiction Reader,
was certainly an early serious article on scifi. But Bazin, whom she
quotes, had already said everything she said in that one. In fact,
some of Bazin's stuff is deliciously Decadent (amorally
estheticizing) in a way Sontag aspired to be, but funnier.
10417
From: Jonathan Rosenbaum
Date: Mon May 31, 2004 5:53am
Subject: Re: Rockism explained! Kael mentioned!
--- In a_film_by@yahoogroups.com, David Ehrenstein
wrote:
>
> --- hotlove666 wrote:
>
> >
> > I saw a new book at Samuel French yesterday - Kael
> > and Sontag:
> > Opposites Attract Me, by a salon.com critic. I have
> > no idea how good
> > the book is, but the choice of dialectic suggests to
> > me that the guy
> > is playing in another universe than I am.
>
> It's reviewed in the NYT today. Looks pretty dumb.
> Sontag and Kael have nothing in common, nad little is
> leaned through compare/contrast.
Actually, I read this book a few days ago, and it's more interesting
and engaging that one might imagine, at least for the quality of its
prose and its arguments. The author, Craig Seligman, is a New Yorker
editor and was a devout friend of Kael's; he also admits at the
outset that he's never had the slightest desire to meet Sontag, and
part of his positions have to do with defending Kael against charges
of homophobia and chastising Sontag for never truly coming out. But
over the course of the book he interrogates a good many of his own
biases about the two women, and in some ways Sontag actually comes
out ahead. As a work of intense self-scrutiny and autocritique, the
book is actually quite fascinating.
Not that there are any insights to be found here about film. The
arguments are virtually all about the ethics of elitism versus the
ethics of populism and the kinds of seriousness that go with each
position....Considering that I know Sontag somewhat and barely knew
Kael at all (apart from a few brief conversations), and that both
had a considerable impact on me as writers when I was much younger,
I think you guys are being quite unfair about the quality of S.S.'s
mind as well as her passion, even if she's gotten a good deal more
staid and conservative over the past couple of decades. In fact, she
was the first person who turned me on to what was really great about
Contempt when it came out, and she was doing this at a time that was
long before such a position was even remotely fashionable. And she
was every bit as hip to what both Kubrick and Tati were doing in the
60s (to cite two other cases), even if little of this insight wound
up in print. It's not just that her taste has always been good (as
Bill admits)--I would even call it close to impeccable--but that she
was surely one of the first writers in English who brought film into
intellectual discussions without a trace of strain or condescension.
And in fact it's quite unfair to regard her enthusiasm for and
interest in some mainstream stuff--including Rio Bravo as well as SF
movies--to be some form of intellectual slumming.
On the other hand, I'm less enthused about her films (or at least
the first three, up through Promised Lands--and would add that
Brother Carl, which is the one I'm most familiar with, is by far the
best; I've never seen her fourth feature, made in Italy, which
adapted one of her stories), and found the narcissism of her last
novel rendered it unreadable. But her role as a popularizer, while
clearly central to her fame, isn't really what distinguishes her the
most as a writer and thinker. I actually think she has more in
common with someone like Elaine May than most people would care to
admit; after all, she once told me that Mike Nichols was her best
friend when she attended the U. of Chicago as a teenager.
Jonathan
10418
From: Jonathan Rosenbaum
Date: Mon May 31, 2004 5:58am
Subject: Re: Jean-Luc Godard, imagined naked.
> > In the interview with her in the Cahiers "Spécial Godard" from
1990
> or 1991, she states that he has/had a very athletic build,
>
> And when I met her at the premier party for La grande bouffe in NY
> and I expressed concern about the accident, she said he was very
> atheletic and strong, so maybe he could get over it. Watching him
> play tennis in Soft and Hard, I'd say he did. AK and I shook
hands,
> and it was weeks before I could bring myself to wash mine.
I know the feeling. I was privileged to spend a whole evening with
her in Vienna a few years ago, at a dinner also attended by John
Berry (her father-in-law), Ben Gazzara, and Luc Moullet, and getting
a goodnight kiss from her afterwards in the hotel elevator was one
of those key moments one never quite gets over. I also found that
she was generally most comfortable when she didn't have to talk too
much about Godard, since that tends to be what interviewers always
ask her about.
10419
From: hotlove666
Date: Mon May 31, 2004 6:30am
Subject: Re: Rockism explained! Kael mentioned!
I actually think she has more in
> common with someone like Elaine May than most people would care to
> admit; after all, she once told me that Mike Nichols was her best
> friend when she attended the U. of Chicago as a teenager.
>
> Jonathan
It's interesting that Sontag knew Mike Nichols, but for me May has a
lot more on the ball, even as a filmmaker. I only met Sontag once,
and I liked her, but I can't say I learned to appreciate anything
from reading her. At the very beginning, when I had just seen Vivre
sa vie and was awed but clueless, reading her piece helped me feel
like there was a kindred spirit out there, but I reread it recently
(after reseeing the film), and it just doesn't have the flashes of
insight that I get from reading any of the good French film critics --
and I mean ANY. Andre S. Labarthe has more interesting things to say
about Godard than Sontag, and Andre is primarily a documentarian.
All this came back to me when I posted links here for her piece on
Abu Ghraib and a piece from City Beat LA. I realized rereading them
that SS was well-written but vapid, totally predictable in the points
it was making, except for the info about the cropping, which she
didn't do anything with, while the guy who had been asked to do a
filler article for a throwaway paper on the torture tape undergound
actually had quite a bit to say.
Of course, stacked up against most American film critics she's a
giant, certainly with respect to taste, but just think of Sontag and
Sarris side by side. I still get little intellectual thrills reading
passages in The American Cinema that I haven't revisited lately --
much more than from Sontag, even though I probably would agree with
her taste in European cinema more than I would with Sarris's. She's
like an earnest student who never outgrew the role.
That said, I did love Duet for Cannibals and would especially like to
see Promised Lands as the Israel-Palestine war wears on toward,
maybe, some resolution born out of mutual exhaustion. All I know is
that it was a documentary about the conflict at a time when only
French leftists were championing the Palestinian cause. I'm sure she
wasn't doing that, but I'd really like to see what she did do. To me
it seemed that the labored quality of her prose - and particularly
the fiction - just blew away when she was able to DO what she had
been talking about and go right for the eyeballs. Duet for Cannibals
struck me a lovely exercise in style, in the best sense of the
expression. Of course, for analysis I'd go to a reporter like the guy
who wrote The Four Questions, but I'd love to see her images.
10420
From: Paul Gallagher
Date: Mon May 31, 2004 6:43am
Subject: Re: Rockism explained! Kael mentioned!
Kael is mentioned in the April Cahiers du Cinéma special
issue, World Cinema Atlas.
"Pauline Kael. One of guardian figures of American
film criticism, Kael, who died in 2001, started writing
about film at the end of the 60s and made a name for
herself, notably in the New Yorker. According to
Dudley Andrew, 'by being one of the first to write about
films made here in America, she made it possible for
Americans to reclaim their films.'"
Of course Kael started writing much earlier -- in 1953,
attacking Chaplin's "Limelight" -- and it's bizarre to
call her "one of the first to write about films made here
in America" (Vachel Lindsay and Louis Delluc were writing
about the American cinema before she born), and I don't see
how "she made it possible for Americans to reclaim their films."
Some Americans, some films -- maybe...
Paul
10421
From: Adrian Martin
Date: Mon May 31, 2004 6:51am
Subject: and the answer is ...
"when I spoke to Colin MacCabe at a
book signing, my first question was whether Godard was impotent
as a result of his 1972 motorcycle accident."
AND WAS HIS ANSWER TO THIS CHOICE QUESTION ???
10422
From: Hadrian
Date: Mon May 31, 2004 6:57am
Subject: Re: Bill/Paul praised! Rockism in film? Seth welcomed!
> One place where the pop/cinema axes seem to cross is
Cinefile,
> Hadrian Belove's videotheque here in LA, which has a DJ on
Friday and
> Saturday nights (and at least three future great filmmakers who
> occasionally man the cash register). Cinefile embodies
everything I
> love about a_film_by and don't find anywhere else. Hadrian, by
the
> way, is habelove, who wrote the post on Castaway and Fedex.
Thanks for the shout-out, Bill! It's true that a large part of
cinefile's conception was a as a bridge between what we saw as
an artificial division of cinema into entertainment and art --though
we did divide the store into two wings, we have shown as much
interest in both, and they obviously bleed. We did consciously
decide not to seperate our directors wall into foreign and
domestic, or trash vs. art. It often amuses me to see Fred
Walton sandwiched between Wajda and Wayne Wang. We are
omnivorous, and most of all, curious.
I haven't kept up on the thread completely, so I can't add much. I
do think as film releasing gets cheaper and cheaper, and the
primary medium becomes DVDs, you can expect more
specialized markets, like in music, with each microniche
interested in their own films. THere's already many more
independent labels than ever existed on VHS.
As for viewing high art at home as opposed to a theatre, I can
confirm that while not the second coming, DVD has been an
enormous help to communicating more difficult films to the
unititiated. When I first saw Antonioni movies on pan-and-scan
blurry videos they bored the hell out of me --as I think they did
most people who weren't already familiar with their power. I
heard somehwere you only feel a poem the first time you read it,
and every time after, you're just remembering that first viewing. I
think that's what vhs was like for films that were intended to be
seen in the cinema (anything pre-1978) --just a reminder of the
film experience.
Now, after over 10 years in the rental biz, I see college kids
renting slow, detail-oriented visual films in far greater numbers
than ever before---Herzog, Antonioni, Hou Hsiao-Hsien. I think
this is DVD at work. Not only do the heightened detail, accurate
aspect ratios, and clear sound of DVDs can combine with a
decent entertainment system for a pretty fair reproduction of a
film's power, but, more importantly for archival stores, they don't
deteriorate with repeated viewings (unless they're scratched, in
which case their ruined anyways) --i think this has been a boon
to all older films, which on vhs were often associated with blurry
images and murky sounds. I had to really care to watch these (I
did), and so I didn't blame the average customer for not renting
them. Now, there's a very slim preference for the new over the
old.
This relates to a more detailed idea i've been considered about
the video generation --people who saw a majority of their films
on vcr's. Symbolically, this was what Tarantino ushered in. I
think it's affected their tastes, and choices in an essential way
--from how they frame shots and their editing rhythmns, all the
way to their subject manner and conception of genre.
OH! And, I guess I won't bother defending myself too much for
being one of the people who "certainly don't 'get' film and
discovered in Kael a model for a certain kind of essayistic prose,
which they seem to think she invented." I will say anyone who
really read Kael extensively wouldn't think that, if only because
she so directly discusses her love for her influences --notably
James Agee and Andre Bazin, and arguably could be extended
to literary types like Henry Miller, Henry James, etc. Sure, she's a
tough cookie, but a hell of a lot of fun. I don't particularly agree
with her more or less than other critics, or friends, but enjoy
hearing her arguments. And as i heard quote someone earlier,
"Whatever gives you pleasure...."
10423
From: Jonathan Rosenbaum
Date: Mon May 31, 2004 6:59am
Subject: Re: Rockism explained! Kael mentioned!
> That said, I did love Duet for Cannibals and would especially like
to
> see Promised Lands as the Israel-Palestine war wears on toward,
> maybe, some resolution born out of mutual exhaustion. All I know
is
> that it was a documentary about the conflict at a time when only
> French leftists were championing the Palestinian cause. I'm sure
she
> wasn't doing that, but I'd really like to see what she did do.
If memory serves, she doesn't address Palestinians or the
Palestinian position at all in the film, or hardly at all, but
sticks with Israelis. What I remember most strongly is her showing
in some detail at the end the methods of an Israeli psychotherapist
using a kind of shock therapy on shellshocked soldiers. Susan was
horrified by this, though there was no commentary in the film saying
so--she just showed a soldier being emotionally brutalized. I
attended a private screening of the film in Paris shortly after it
was made, attended also by Bresson (whom she greeted as "cher
maitre"), and recall Susan comparing the shrink at the end (in
conversation, not in the film) to Dr. Strangelove.
10424
From: Jonathan Rosenbaum
Date: Mon May 31, 2004 7:02am
Subject: Re: and the answer is ...
--- In a_film_by@yahoogroups.com, Adrian Martin
wrote:
> "when I spoke to Colin MacCabe at a
> book signing, my first question was whether Godard was impotent
> as a result of his 1972 motorcycle accident."
>
> AND WAS HIS ANSWER TO THIS CHOICE QUESTION ???
I don't know what Colin said. But I do know that Richard Roud, who
knew Godard pretty well, spoke around the time of the accident of
Godard having been sexually incapacitated by it. And Gorin much
later, and more than once, referred to Godard having been "sexually
wounded".
10425
From: Jonathan Rosenbaum
Date: Mon May 31, 2004 7:15am
Subject: Re: Rockism explained! Kael mentioned!
> Of course, stacked up against most American film critics she's a
> giant, certainly with respect to taste, but just think of Sontag
and
> Sarris side by side. I still get little intellectual thrills
reading
> passages in The American Cinema that I haven't revisited lately --
> much more than from Sontag, even though I probably would agree
with
> her taste in European cinema more than I would with Sarris's.
She's
> like an earnest student who never outgrew the role.
That describes what I love about Susan pretty exactly; she's never
grown up, and for me that's mainly a recommendation. And I value her
enormously for the way she combines film appreciation with
appreciation of the other arts. But I'd never take her seriously as
a film critic, in the final analysis. She's was one of the first to
alert everyone to how special Manny Farber was (I believe in "On
Style"), but I can't think of any extended analysis of any film by
her that isn't pedantic in some fashion. She's much more memorable
in passing remarks.
10426
From: hotlove666
Date: Mon May 31, 2004 7:45am
Subject: Re: Rockism explained! Kael mentioned!
--- In a_film_by@yahoogroups.com, "Paul Gallagher"
wrote:
> Kael is mentioned in the April Cahiers du Cinéma special
> issue, World Cinema Atlas.
>
> "Pauline Kael. One of guardian figures of American
> film criticism, Kael, who died in 2001, started writing
> about film at the end of the 60s and made a name for
> herself, notably in the New Yorker. According to
> Dudley Andrew, 'by being one of the first to write about
> films made here in America, she made it possible for
> Americans to reclaim their films.'"
>
> Of course Kael started writing much earlier -- in 1953,
> attacking Chaplin's "Limelight" -- and it's bizarre to
> call her "one of the first to write about films made here
> in America" (Vachel Lindsay and Louis Delluc were writing
> about the American cinema before she born), and I don't see
> how "she made it possible for Americans to reclaim their films."
> Some Americans, some films -- maybe...
>
>
> Paul
I am surprised at Dudley -- I was given to understand that the
history of criticism is one of his specialties. The following
anecdote may or may not have something to do with at least two of the
weird howlers in your quote -- the ones that are his, in any case.
When I praised Chris Fujiwara -- who had just compared Daney to Kael,
and not to Kael's advantage -- for being the first person to use the
word "auteur" at the Daney conference, Dudley accused me of trying to
hijack the conference: an uncomfortable choice of words for a
conference happening in Boston, and a very strange reaction to
someone bringing up auteurism at a Serge Daney event. (Of course the
conference title was "Serge Daney: Beyond Film Criticism," which at
one point started to sound like it might be shorthand for:
Interdisciplinary Grant Proposals Accepted Here...) Dudley later took
that back in a nice e-mail, but I think he may still have a bit of
the academic prejudice against auteurism -- which is finally going
away according to one of the Harvard faculty, speaking during the
amazingly heated exchange that followed my innocent remark.
Anyway, if Million Dollar Legs really needed reclaiming, I guess we
all owe Kael a sincere "gosh thanks" for that one.
10427
From:
Date: Mon May 31, 2004 7:45am
Subject: Re: Rockism explained! Kael mentioned!
Have been very much enjoying the discussion on aesthetics of pop & rock
music. And learning from it. I know little about pop music - am mainly a classical
music fan.
In classical music, am an auteurist, too. I am mainly interested in
composers, not performers. I love the composers' artistry, and want to understand it
deeply, within the context of the composer's whole creative career. This
perspective - seeing music or films as works of art, and from the perspective of an
artist's whole output - is the core of auteurism.
This point of view is far from universal among classical music fans.
Classical music is afflicted with cults of virtuoso performers - people who listen
mainly to hear star pianists or violinists. I respect piants and singers and
conductors, but mainly want them to be good, sensitive craftsmen who reveal the
composers' intentions.
The point about music being joined to visual experience is very well taken..
In classical music, we have opera and ballet, two of the greatest art forms
ever devised. I love film versions of both! I also love music videos, both
classical and pop. There is a whole cable TV channel that shows classical music
videos - CAS, Creative Arts Showcase. It frequently has me glued to the TV set.
Mike Grost
10428
From: jpcoursodon
Date: Mon May 31, 2004 1:43pm
Subject: Re: Bill/Paul praised! Rockism in film? Seth welcomed!
--- In a_film_by@yahoogroups.com, David Ehrenstein
wrote:
>
> --- jpcoursodon wrote:
>
> > Why would you take anybody's word -- especially
> > AK's -- for
> > everything?
> >
> Oh Tut-Tut, J-P. She is a Goddess! One of my very
> favorite film stars. I adore her. Right next to Julie
> Christie.
>
> And frankly don't you wish Julie Christie were
> President of the United States instead of the Beyond
> Loathesome Bush?
>
>
> Unfair, David! Of course I'd wish almost anybody as president
instead of GWB -- even Anna Karina.
She is (was) very cute but her goddessness escapes me. I
always found her irritating (and never liked the way JLG treated her
in films -- and probably off screen too).
You probably know that she was 'discovered' starring in a
soap commercial (not a TV commercial, there was no such thing in
France at the time; those commercials were made for and shown in
movie theatres). All the cinephiles were in love with her (even some
of the gay ones I guess).
> JPC
> __________________________________
> Do you Yahoo!?
> Friends. Fun. Try the all-new Yahoo! Messenger.
> http://messenger.yahoo.com/
10429
From: jpcoursodon
Date: Mon May 31, 2004 2:05pm
Subject: Re: Bill/Paul praised! Rockism in film? Seth welcomed!
--- In a_film_by@yahoogroups.com, "jpcoursodon"
wrote:
> --- In a_film_by@yahoogroups.com, David Ehrenstein
> wrote:
> >
> > --- jpcoursodon wrote:
> >
> She is (was) very cute but her goddessness escapes me. I
> always found her irritating (and never liked the way JLG treated
her
> in films -- and probably off screen too).
>
> > JPC
> > ___
I should really qualify the above statement. "Vivre sa vie" is my
favorite early Godard, and she is wonderful in it and not at all
irritating.
Has anybody seen "Vivre ensemble", the one film she directed (as
well as played in)?
JPC
10430
From: David Ehrenstein
Date: Mon May 31, 2004 2:17pm
Subject: Re: Re: Bill/Paul praised! Rockism in film? Seth welcomed!
--- jpcoursodon wrote:
All the cinephiles were in love
> with her (even some
> of the gay ones I guess).
> > JPC
Quite true. That's what's so amusing about casting
Brialy opposite her in "A Woman is a Woman" and the
Serge Gainsbourg TV Musical "Anna."
__________________________________
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10431
From: Elizabeth Anne Nolan
Date: Mon May 31, 2004 3:14pm
Subject: Serge Daney: Beyond Film Criticism
--- In a_film_by@yahoogroups.com, "hotlove666" wrote:
> conference title was "Serge Daney: Beyond Film Criticism,"
Thanks for mentioninng this; found some good sites, including Paul
Grant's SENSES OF CINEMA with your photo.
10432
From: hotlove666
Date: Mon May 31, 2004 4:02pm
Subject: Re: Bill/Paul praised! Rockism in film? Seth welcomed!
>
> Quite true. That's what's so amusing about casting
> Brialy opposite her in "A Woman is a Woman" and the
> Serge Gainsbourg TV Musical "Anna."
I just picked that up for 3 bucks at Amoeba. Bought it for my ex-, a
Gainsbourgian, who said it was "une merde." Should I take a look? My
experience has also been that SG, the great genius of French pop, was
pretty "merdique" in his taste in his movie career.
10433
From: Jonathan Rosenbaum
Date: Mon May 31, 2004 4:19pm
Subject: Re: Bill/Paul praised! Rockism in film? Seth welcomed!
>
> Has anybody seen "Vivre ensemble", the one film she directed (as
> well as played in)?
> JPC
I did, when it was in the Critic's Week at Cannes (and was brutally
attacked by Alexander Walker). It wasn't bad, in my opinion. She did
a second feature as well, but I never saw that one.
10434
From: David Ehrenstein
Date: Mon May 31, 2004 4:33pm
Subject: Re: Re: Bill/Paul praised! Rockism in film? Seth welcomed!
You've got the video? I've never seen it. Always
longed to cause I love Gainsbourg.
Truffaut mentioned it in a 1966 CdC interview on a
list of "trendy" films he hated. Klein's marvelous
"Qui-Etes Vous Polly Magoo?" was also on that list.
--- hotlove666 wrote:
>
> >
> > Quite true. That's what's so amusing about casting
> > Brialy opposite her in "A Woman is a Woman" and
> the
> > Serge Gainsbourg TV Musical "Anna."
>
> I just picked that up for 3 bucks at Amoeba. Bought
> it for my ex-, a
> Gainsbourgian, who said it was "une merde." Should I
> take a look? My
> experience has also been that SG, the great genius
> of French pop, was
> pretty "merdique" in his taste in his movie career.
>
>
>
>
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10435
From: Paul Gallagher
Date: Mon May 31, 2004 5:34pm
Subject: Re: Bill/Paul praised! Rockism in film? Seth welcomed!
--- In a_film_by@yahoogroups.com, "hotlove666" wrote:
>
> I just picked that up for 3 bucks at Amoeba. Bought it for my ex-, a
> Gainsbourgian, who said it was "une merde." Should I take a look? My
> experience has also been that SG, the great genius of French pop, was
> pretty "merdique" in his taste in his movie career.
I was unimpressed by the one film of his I've seen -- _Je t'aime moi
non plus_ with Birkin and Dallesandro, but Godard had some praise
for Gainsbourg's film work.
Michèle Halberstadt: I've always seen a parallel between you
and Serge Gainsbourg.
Jean-Luc Godard: I thank you. I'm very fond of Charlotte For Ever.
I was thinking of the duality between the work and the person.
Michèle Halberstadt: We admired the musician but had trouble
with the public persona. With you it's the opposite. We respect
the man more than we look at the work.
Jean-Luc Godard: The paths have moved apart. I've remained a
memorialist of this profession in all its qualities. I've always
liked every aspect of cinema. This world of film, which is the world
in miniature. Films come into being at a certain moment,
they bloom, they live, grow old, die, all within a brief period
of time.
---
10436
From: Damien Bona
Date: Mon May 31, 2004 5:37pm
Subject: Re: Bill/Paul praised! Rockism in film? Seth welcomed!
--- In a_film_by@yahoogroups.com, David Ehrenstein
wrote:
>
> --- jpcoursodon wrote:
> All the cinephiles were in love
> > with her (even some
> > of the gay ones I guess).
> > > JPC
>
> Quite true. That's what's so amusing about casting
> Brialy opposite her in "A Woman is a Woman" and the
> Serge Gainsbourg TV Musical "Anna."
>
David, please elaborate (i.e. why is the casting of Brialy amusing?).
10437
From: Joseph Kaufman
Date: Mon May 31, 2004 5:56pm
Subject: Re: Bill/Paul praised! Rockism in film? Seth welcomed!
>I just picked that up for 3 bucks at Amoeba. Bought it for my ex-, a
>Gainsbourgian, who said it was "une merde." Should I take a look? My
>experience has also been that SG, the great genius of French pop, was
>pretty "merdique" in his taste in his movie career.
I'd love to see it, at least. Along these lines, should the 1967
Brigitte Bardot musical TV special come your way, it's wonderful.
Lots of Gainsbourg in there, including "Bonnie and Clyde", from which
Faye Dunaway adapted her look in the Penn film. It's all enough to
make you forget Bardot's current politics for an hour. (It's on a
PAL region 0 compilation called DIVINE B.B.)
--
- Joe Kaufman
10438
From: Paul Gallagher
Date: Mon May 31, 2004 5:53pm
Subject: Re: Bill/Paul praised! Rockism in film? Seth welcomed!
--- In a_film_by@yahoogroups.com, David Ehrenstein
wrote:
> You've got the video? I've never seen it. Always
> longed to cause I love Gainsbourg.
>
> Truffaut mentioned it in a 1966 CdC interview on a
> list of "trendy" films he hated. Klein's marvelous
> "Qui-Etes Vous Polly Magoo?" was also on that list.
>
I found out about "Qui êtes-vous" in a roundabout way. When I saw
Preminger's "Skidoo," I liked Donyale Luna and set out to see
all her films. (The only other actress to get that honor (?) from me
is Bette Davis.) She appeared in a fascinating assortment of films:
Carmelo Bene's "Salome," Fellini's "Satyricon," Preminger's
"Skidoo," "Qui êtes-vous," Warhol's "Camp" and "Screen Tests,"
"The Rolling Stones Rock and Roll Circus," "Tonite Let's All
Make Love in London," and "Soft Self-Portrait of Salvador Dali" --
films which taken together seem to define an important
cultural moment.
Plus I'm surprised Carmelo Bene is so little seen, since he was
a very well-known theater director and his films are good....
Paul
10439
From: jpcoursodon
Date: Mon May 31, 2004 6:08pm
Subject: Re: Bill/Paul praised! Rockism in film? Seth welcomed!
--- In a_film_by@yahoogroups.com, "Paul Gallagher"
wrote:
>
> I was unimpressed by the one film of his I've seen -- _Je t'aime
moi
> non plus_ with Birkin and Dallesandro, but Godard had some praise
> for Gainsbourg's film work.
>
"Charlotte for ever" is an extraordinary film, incredibly
courageous, very hard to "like" and impossible to dismiss or forget.
Most French critics hated it.
JPC
10440
From: David Ehrenstein
Date: Mon May 31, 2004 6:33pm
Subject: Re: Re: Bill/Paul praised! Rockism in film? Seth welcomed!
--- Damien Bona wrote:
>
> David, please elaborate (i.e. why is the casting of
> Brialy amusing?).
>
>
Because there were all these scenes of Brialy and
karina in bed together. J-L G knew he had nothing to
fear if Anna was snuggling with a gay man.
The closest Brialy has ever come to a woman was touch
Claire's Knee.
__________________________________
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10441
From: David Ehrenstein
Date: Mon May 31, 2004 6:37pm
Subject: Re: Re: Bill/Paul praised! Rockism in film? Seth welcomed!
--- Paul Gallagher wrote:
>
> I found out about "Qui êtes-vous" in a roundabout
> way. When I saw
> Preminger's "Skidoo," I liked Donyale Luna and set
> out to see
> all her films. (The only other actress to get that
> honor (?) from me
> is Bette Davis.) She appeared in a fascinating
> assortment of films:
> Carmelo Bene's "Salome," Fellini's "Satyricon,"
> Preminger's
> "Skidoo," "Qui êtes-vous," Warhol's "Camp" and
> "Screen Tests,"
> "The Rolling Stones Rock and Roll Circus," "Tonite
> Let's All
> Make Love in London," and "Soft Self-Portrait of
> Salvador Dali" --
> films which taken together seem to define an
> important
> cultural moment.
>
There's a marvelous recollection of Donayle Luna
chatting with Nico "in their mittle-Martian accents"
up at John Phillip Law's house on Miller Drive during
the shooting of "Skidoo" in Bill Reed's "Early
Plastic."
> Plus I'm surprised Carmelo Bene is so little seen,
> since he was
> a very well-known theater director and his films are
> good....
>
Bene was the Italian Werner Schoreter -- with just as
much luck in getting a U.S. release for his films.
He plays Creon in Pasolini's "Oedipus Rex."
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10442
From: jpcoursodon
Date: Mon May 31, 2004 8:26pm
Subject: Re: Bill/Paul praised! Rockism in film? Seth welcomed!
--- In a_film_by@yahoogroups.com, David Ehrenstein
wrote:
>
> There's a marvelous recollection of Donayle Luna
> chatting with Nico "in their mittle-Martian accents"
> up at John Phillip Law's house on Miller Drive during
> the shooting of "Skidoo" in Bill Reed's "Early
> Plastic."
>
> > Plus I'm surprised Carmelo Bene is so little seen,
> > since he was
> > a very well-known theater director and his films are
> > good....
> >
> Bene was the Italian Werner Schoreter -- with just as
> much luck in getting a U.S. release for his films.
>
> He plays Creon in Pasolini's "Oedipus Rex."
>
>
>
>
> __________________________________
> Do you Yahoo!?
> Friends. Fun. Try the all-new Yahoo! Messenger.
> http://messenger.yahoo.com/
10443
From: jpcoursodon
Date: Mon May 31, 2004 8:55pm
Subject: Re: Bill/Paul praised! Rockism in film? Seth welcomed!
> > >
> > Bene was the Italian Werner Schoreter -- with just as
> > much luck in getting a U.S. release for his films.
> >
Schroeter's films are hard to find anywhere. The only one I have
seen (more than 20 years ago), "The Death of Maria Malibran", is a
splendiferous piece of high camp. The much more recent "Malina"
sounds fascinating although the notion of having Isabelle Huppert
playing, in French, a Austrian poetess in Vienna (her co-star is the
equally very French Matthieu Carriere as a German or Austrain writer)
is disconcerting to say the least. Especially in view of the fact
that language seems to play an essential part in the film. But then
realism or verisimilitude of any sort are not to be expected in any
Schroeter film.
JPC
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > __________________________________
> > Do you Yahoo!?
> > Friends. Fun. Try the all-new Yahoo! Messenger.
> > http://messenger.yahoo.com/
10444
From: jess_l_amortell
Date: Mon May 31, 2004 9:36pm
Subject: Schroeter & Huppert
--- In a_film_by@yahoogroups.com, "jpcoursodon" wrote:
> The much more recent "Malina"
> sounds fascinating although the notion of having Isabelle Huppert
> playing, in French, a Austrian poetess in Vienna (her co-star is the
> equally very French Matthieu Carriere as a German or Austrain writer)
> is disconcerting to say the least.
She played an Austrian piano pedagogue in Haneke's LA PIANISTE (from a nove=
l by Elfriede Jelinek who was also involved in the Schroeter, I see) -- perh=
aps she's in danger of becoming stereotyped!
10445
From: Robert Keser
Date: Mon May 31, 2004 9:53pm
Subject: Re: Schroeter and Huppert
--- In a_film_by@yahoogroups.com, "jpcoursodon"
wrote:
"Malina"
> sounds fascinating although the notion of having Isabelle Huppert
> playing, in French, a Austrian poetess in Vienna (her co-star is
the
> equally very French Matthieu Carriere as a German or Austrain
writer)
> is disconcerting to say the least. Especially in view of the fact
> that language seems to play an essential part in the film.
This can only fondly recall that scene in Lola Montès where Anton
Wahlbrook congratulates Lola on her command of German, when she has
just spoken in French.
--Robert Keser
10446
From:
Date: Mon May 31, 2004 7:06pm
Subject: Re: Schroeter and Huppert
-- In a_film_by@yahoogroups.com, "jpcoursodon"
wrote:
"Malina"
> sounds fascinating although the notion of having Isabelle Huppert
> playing, in French, a Austrian poetess in Vienna (her co-star is
the
> equally very French Matthieu Carriere as a German or Austrain
writer)
> is disconcerting to say the least. Especially in view of the fact
> that language seems to play an essential part in the film.
I respect your point of view, but this does not really seem odd to me. If
Huppert gives a good performance, having her act in French would be just grand.
This might be getting at something we were discussing in an earlier post.
French cinema tends to restrict itself to French speaking characters. (They can
be in Switzerland, Belgium or overseas, as well as France.) While Hollywood has
made countless films set all over the world, with English-speaking actors
playing Russians, Germans, Frenchmen, etc.
For example, I was perfectly happy watching Hugh Grant play Chopin, in
English, in "Impromptu" (James Lapine). Obviously, Grant is just about as English as
they come. But this seemed "natural". It's a movie, he's an actor, playing
characters is his job!
Art or Imagination (Huppert giving a great performance) seems far more
important than Realism (having a film about an Austrian being in German).
In general, the current interest in realism is something alien to me. Current
mystery novels open with pages of acknowledgements to experts consulted by
the author. Whereas oldtime authors tended just to write, making things up out
of their imagination. Dale Messick, creator of the comic strip "Brenda Starr",
was once asked about this sort of research. "Authenticity", she declared, "is
something I always struggle to avoid."
Mike Grost
10447
From: Noel Vera
Date: Mon May 31, 2004 11:29pm
Subject: Re: Jean-Luc Godard, imagined naked.
> AK and
> I shook hands,
> and it was weeks before I could bring myself to wash
> mine.
I can understand that feeling. Was in a film festival
in New Delhi and sharing a hotel room with a festival
programmer when Shamrila Tagore (the beautiful,
beautiful young bride in World of Apu, and the
great-granddaughter of the famous poet) visited us. I
served tea; she asked to use the bathroom. We (the
programmer and I) worshipped that toilet seat for the
remainder of our stay.
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10448
From: Dan Sallitt
Date: Mon May 31, 2004 11:49pm
Subject: Mathieu Carriere
> (her co-star is the
> equally very French Matthieu Carriere as a German or Austrain writer)
But Carriere (a superb actor, in my opinion) has been in so many
German-language films. And the IMDb says he was born in Hannover. I've
always assumed he had some strong cultural connection to Germany. - Dan
10449
From: David Ehrenstein
Date: Tue Jun 1, 2004 0:02am
Subject: Re: Mathieu Carriere
Barbara Steele tells me he was terrified of doing love
scenes with her in "Young Toerless."
Can't imagine why.
Like Jacques Perrin he was Just Too Damned Pretty to
become a star.
--- Dan Sallitt wrote:
> > (her co-star is the
> > equally very French Matthieu Carriere as a German
> or Austrain writer)
>
> But Carriere (a superb actor, in my opinion) has
> been in so many
> German-language films. And the IMDb says he was
> born in Hannover. I've
> always assumed he had some strong cultural
> connection to Germany. - Dan
>
>
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10450
From: jpcoursodon
Date: Tue Jun 1, 2004 1:10am
Subject: Re: Schroeter & Huppert
--- In a_film_by@yahoogroups.com, "jess_l_amortell"
wrote:
> --- In a_film_by@yahoogroups.com, "jpcoursodon"
wrote:
> > The much more recent "Malina"
> > sounds fascinating although the notion of having Isabelle Huppert
> > playing, in French, a Austrian poetess in Vienna (her co-star is
the
> > equally very French Matthieu Carriere as a German or Austrain
writer)
> > is disconcerting to say the least.
>
>
> She played an Austrian piano pedagogue in Haneke's LA PIANISTE
(from a nove=
> l by Elfriede Jelinek who was also involved in the Schroeter, I
see) -- perh=
> aps she's in danger of becoming stereotyped!
>
> I almost added that to my post but didn't out of laziness. I knew
somewhat would mention it. I absolutely hate LA PIANISTE.
>
10451
From: David Ehrenstein
Date: Tue Jun 1, 2004 1:10am
Subject: Re: Re: Bill/Paul praised! Rockism in film? Seth welcomed!
--- jpcoursodon wrote:
>
> > > >
> > > Bene was the Italian Werner Schoreter -- with
> just as
> > > much luck in getting a U.S. release for his
> films.
> > >
> Schroeter's films are hard to find anywhere. The
> only one I have
> seen (more than 20 years ago), "The Death of Maria
> Malibran", is a
> splendiferous piece of high camp.
His name was made by such camp creations, but his best
films are the deply serious Italian ones: "Kingdom of
Naples" and my favorite of all his films "Palermo oder
Wolfsburg." In these he takes up where Visconti left
off in "La Terra Trema." I'm thinking of Bazin's
insight that Visconti filmed his fishermen as if they
were "Rennaissance Princes."
The much more
> recent "Malina"
> sounds fascinating although the notion of having
> Isabelle Huppert
> playing, in French, a Austrian poetess in Vienna
> (her co-star is the
> equally very French Matthieu Carriere as a German or
> Austrain writer)
> is disconcerting to say the least. Especially in
> view of the fact
> that language seems to play an essential part in the
> film. But then
> realism or verisimilitude of any sort are not to be
> expected in any
> Schroeter film.
>
> JPC
>
I'm reminded of Bertolucci's exquisite (and nearly
forgotten) "Partner," in which Pierre Clementi spoke
French while everyone else in the film spoke Italian.
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > > __________________________________
> > > Do you Yahoo!?
> > > Friends. Fun. Try the all-new Yahoo!
> Messenger.
> > > http://messenger.yahoo.com/
>
>
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10452
From: jpcoursodon
Date: Tue Jun 1, 2004 1:41am
Subject: Re: Bill/Paul praised! Rockism in film? Seth welcomed!
--- In a_film_by@yahoogroups.com, David Ehrenstein
wrote:
>
> --- jpcoursodon wrote:
> >
> > > > >
> > > > Bene was the Italian Werner Schoreter -- with
> > just as
> > > > much luck in getting a U.S. release for his
> > films.
> > > >
> > Schroeter's films are hard to find anywhere. The
> > only one I have
> > seen (more than 20 years ago), "The Death of Maria
> > Malibran", is a
> > splendiferous piece of high camp.
>
> His name was made by such camp creations, but his best
> films are the deply serious Italian ones: "Kingdom of
> Naples" and my favorite of all his films "Palermo oder
> Wolfsburg." In these he takes up where Visconti left
> off in "La Terra Trema." I'm thinking of Bazin's
> insight that Visconti filmed his fishermen as if they
> were "Rennaissance Princes."
>
Whereas of course Renaissance princes should be filmed as if they
were fishermen if filmed by Visconti.
But where do I see the deeply serious Schroeter stuff, David? Not
everybody has seen everything like you have.
> The much more
> > recent "Malina"
> > sounds fascinating although the notion of having
> > Isabelle Huppert
> > playing, in French, a Austrian poetess in Vienna
> > (her co-star is the
> > equally very French Matthieu Carriere as a German or
> > Austrain writer)
> > is disconcerting to say the least. Especially in
> > view of the fact
> > that language seems to play an essential part in the
> > film. But then
> > realism or verisimilitude of any sort are not to be
> > expected in any
> > Schroeter film.
> >
> >
> >
> I'm reminded of Bertolucci's exquisite (and nearly
> forgotten) "Partner," in which Pierre Clementi spoke
> French while everyone else in the film spoke Italian.
>
> The Italian cinema is alas hopeless as far as soundtracks are
concerned (although they have recently started to do some direct
sound recording-- it's so new that they mention it in the credits. )
> > > >
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > __________________________________
> > > > Do you Yahoo!?
> > > > Friends. Fun. Try the all-new Yahoo!
> > Messenger.
> > > > http://messenger.yahoo.com/
> >
> >
>
>
>
>
>
> __________________________________
> Do you Yahoo!?
> Friends. Fun. Try the all-new Yahoo! Messenger.
> http://messenger.yahoo.com/
10453
From: David Ehrenstein
Date: Tue Jun 1, 2004 2:02am
Subject: Re: Re: Bill/Paul praised! Rockism in film? Seth welcomed!
--- jpcoursodon wrote:
>
> But where do I see the deeply serious Schroeter
> stuff, David? Not
> everybody has seen everything like you have.
>
I wish I had the answer to that J-P. Film festivals
used to be the only venue for talents like Schroeter
and Bene. Now they're fewer and father between.
I devoted a chapter of my "Fil: The Front Line --
1984" to Schroeter in the hopes of encouraging someone
to give "Palermo oder Wolfsburg" a release. No luck.
A couple of years back his quasi-documentary about
opera singers -- in which the singers sang they
favorite arias to the person they most loved (I can't
recall the title) got a limited U.S. release.
Schoreter staged the operas performed in Herzog's
"Fitzcarraldo" and he appears with his favorite
leading lady, Magdalena Montezuma, in Fassbinder's
early masterpiece "Beware of a Holy Whore."
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10454
From: jpcoursodon
Date: Tue Jun 1, 2004 3:47am
Subject: Re: Jean-Luc Godard, imagined naked.
--- In a_film_by@yahoogroups.com, Noel Vera wrote:
> > AK and
> > I shook hands,
> > and it was weeks before I could bring myself to wash
> > mine.
>
> I can understand that feeling. Was in a film festival
> in New Delhi and sharing a hotel room with a festival
> programmer when Shamrila Tagore (the beautiful,
> beautiful young bride in World of Apu, and the
> great-granddaughter of the famous poet) visited us. I
> served tea; she asked to use the bathroom. We (the
> programmer and I) worshipped that toilet seat for the
> remainder of our stay.
>
>
> Isn't this pushing worship just a wee bit too far? Did the
two of you actually kneel in front of that toilet? Come on guys,
those stars are only human, after all (or am I rocking someone's
dream boat?)
JPC
>
> __________________________________
> Do you Yahoo!?
> Friends. Fun. Try the all-new Yahoo! Messenger.
> http://messenger.yahoo.com/
10455
From:
Date: Tue Jun 1, 2004 0:17am
Subject: Rockism/artism catchup
Jamie, sorry for the vitriol. I obviously took your Waits/R&B comment at face
value. Satire just doesn't translate well in an email.
Zach, I'm not sure I understand your query "as to where you draw the line
between an "-ist" statement and one that merely engenders communication." In
retrospect, I guess I was less interested in identifying Jamie's misunderstood
comment as rockist than in, to tweak your phrase, making visible the calified
bias. (And, yes, I am not attacking someone who might hold
the opinion about Kiarostami being preferable to explosions. I hold it
myself). If Jamie had simply said "I prefer Waits to R&B," I probably would have
ignored it. And I don't think that preference is enough to label Jamie a rockist.
I, for one, prefer, say, Mary J. Blige to Waits but I prefer Waits to Celine
Dion. Now had he said, "All music must be author-centered, available for
interpretation rather than dancing, fucking, etc. and that's why I prefer Waits to
R&B," and meant it this time, then I would say he was under the sway of some
serious rockism. And, of course, the same would apply to a similar comment in
relation to film.
Even at that, though, I don't think that would render communication
impossible. I would try to sway him away from such a rigid position. Because, in the
end, it's the "at least we can all agree" concept that shuts down communication.
Did that answer your question?
Meltzer's piece on Cameron Crowe is in Da Capo Best Music Writing 2001.
Kevin John
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
10456
From:
Date: Tue Jun 1, 2004 0:43am
Subject: Re: Gehr movie online
In a message dated 5/30/04 5:50:25 PM, f@f... writes:
> Perhaps a wild free for all party in chat with David and JPC
> and Bill K and all of our chattiest members going at it at once?
>
I'd be up for that!
Kevin John
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
10457
From: Damien Bona
Date: Tue Jun 1, 2004 5:27am
Subject: Re: Bill/Paul praised! Rockism in film? Seth welcomed!
--- In a_film_by@yahoogroups.com, David Ehrenstein
wrote:
> >
> Because there were all these scenes of Brialy and
> karina in bed together. J-L G knew he had nothing to
> fear if Anna was snuggling with a gay man.
>
> The closest Brialy has ever come to a woman was touch
> Claire's Knee.
Thanks, David. I've always liked Brialy on screen and I had a
wonderful meal at his restaurant on Ille St. Louis, but I had never
heard that he was a gay homosexual.
10458
From:
Date: Tue Jun 1, 2004 1:52am
Subject: Re: B'way Musicals
In a message dated 5/30/04 11:24:07 AM, cellar47@y... writes:
> His "Visual Pleasure in 1959" -- an analysis of Mankiewicz's "Suddenly Last
> Summer" is in the
> collection "Out Takes: Essays on Queer Theory and Film" edited by Ellis
> Hanson (Duke Universty Press, 1999)
>
Also in Out Takes is Lee Edelman's "Rear Window's Glasshole" whch I actually
prefer to Miller's "Anal/Rope," great though it still is, for the way it
fleshes out Miller's argument. It's also laugh-out-loud funny!!
Kevin John
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
10459
From: Damien Bona
Date: Tue Jun 1, 2004 6:50am
Subject: Re: Rockism/artism catchup
--- In a_film_by@yahoogroups.com, LiLiPUT1@a... wrote:
> I, for one, prefer, say, Mary J. Blige to Waits but I prefer Waits
to Celine
> Dion. Now had he said, "All music must be author-centered,
available for
> interpretation rather than dancing, fucking, etc. and that's why I
prefer Waits to
> R&B," and meant it this time, then I would say he was under the
sway of some
> serious rockism. And, of course, the same would apply to a similar
comment in
> relation to film.
>
> Even at that, though, I don't think that would render communication
> impossible. I would try to sway him away from such a rigid
position. Because, in the
> end, it's the "at least we can all agree" concept that shuts down
communication.
> Did that answer your question?
Lately I've been listening to a lot of air checks from Top 40 radio
stations of the 60s, and it reminded me how back then you would have
the Beatles followed by Motown followed by the schlock of a Bobby
Vinton followed by the psychedelia of the Blues Magoos.
A few years later in the heyday of FM radio, within a 2 hour period,
you'd hear Procul Harum, Judy Collins, Curtis Mayfield, Yes, Janis
Joplin, The Flying Burrito Brothers, Nina Simone, Sea Train, The
Allman Brothers, Gordon Lightfoot, Circus Maximus, Van Morrison, The
Mothers Of Invention, Black Sabbath, Keith Jarrett, J Geils, Phil
Ochs, Jeff Beck, Marvin Gaye, Spirit, Taj Mahal, The Kinks, Eric
Andersen.
Which is all to say, that ideally the distinction wasn't between
different genres but rather simply Good Music vs. Bad Music, And the
wonderful period roughly from 1962 to 1975 was such an ideal time –
and if we all try to hold on to the feeling of that era, one doesn't
have to declare a preference between a Mary Bilge and a Tom Waits.
-- Damien
10460
From:
Date: Tue Jun 1, 2004 3:30am
Subject: stylish clothing/fashion fascism/Arzner
In a message dated 5/30/04 12:14:49 PM, ean@s... writes:
> Men all seem to have their shirts hanging out; nobody tucks them in
> anymore. Even dress shirts have gone the way of the polo? Don't men want to show
> their trim waist lines? I guess not if the pants are hanging so low.
>
See - this is what I hate about fashion dictates. They're all based on the
assumption that everyone on earth is thin. Elizabeth, I, for one, don't have a
trim waistline. And the tucking in the shirt thang is pure fascism. It only
works if you don't have a gut; if you do, the tucking just accentuates it. Trust
me, people - I look much better, more stylish, all that with my shirt
untucked.
Of course, comfort rarely seems to be an issue with fashion dictates.
Comtemporary film may be unstylish or undressed but classical Hollywood cinema can be
downright uncomfortable to watch/ponder, esp. if any portion of the film
takes place in the summer. No golden era should have anyone wearing a three-piece
suit and a hat or heels, hose and makeup in stifling heat.
Let's face it - the purpose of dressing stylishly is so that you can move
through the capitalist machine more smoothly. A tucked in shirt arbitrarily, like
all signs, connotes success, authority, professionalism. And it's that
arbitrariness, built on thinness as a standard, that I find objectionable.
But that's semiotics for ya. You just gotta deal with it, for the most part.
So for me, my fashion hero is Dorothy Arzner (it used to be Adrian until I
found out that Joan Crawford was responsible for that masterful ironing board
dress in Today We Live). The ONLY convincing defense I've ever heard for dressing
stylishly is unintentionally laid out in Judith Mayne's Directed by Dorothy
Arzner, still one of the very best books I've ever read on film. Much less of a
crybaby than me, Arzner succeeded against all odds in part by adhering to
those arbitrary fashion conventions with a vengeance. And her frequently mannish
garb was almost a parody of phallic privilege in Hollywood. In short, she
dealt with it in order to achieve the near impossible.
So I'll lost some weight. I'll deal with it. But I'll always bitch about it.
Kevin John
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
10461
From: hotlove666
Date: Tue Jun 1, 2004 10:11am
Subject: Re: Jean-Luc Godard, imagined naked.
Was in a film festival
> in New Delhi and sharing a hotel room with a festival
> programmer when Shamrila Tagore (the beautiful,
> beautiful young bride in World of Apu, and the
> great-granddaughter of the famous poet) visited us. I
> served tea; she asked to use the bathroom. We (the
> programmer and I) worshipped that toilet seat for the
> remainder of our stay.
You didn't keep it? I literally blew a chance to reconcile with my ex-
because I didn't want to miss Sharmilla presenting Music Room at
MOMA. WHAT A BABE!
10462
From: David Ehrenstein
Date: Tue Jun 1, 2004 1:23pm
Subject: Re: Re: Bill/Paul praised! Rockism in film? Seth welcomed!
--- Damien Bona wrote:
>
>
> Thanks, David. I've always liked Brialy on screen
> and I had a
> wonderful meal at his restaurant on Ille St. Louis,
> but I had never
> heard that he was a gay homosexual.
>
>
And a figure of epochal cinematic importance in this
regard. By bringing his boytoy du jour to the Cannes
film festival (WAY back in the day) and introducting
him to the right people, Brialy is responsible for
giving the world
(wait for it )
Alain Delon.
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10463
From: jpcoursodon
Date: Tue Jun 1, 2004 2:03pm
Subject: Re: stylish clothing/fashion fascism/Arzner
--- In a_film_by@yahoogroups.com, LiLiPUT1@a... wrote:
>
> In a message dated 5/30/04 12:14:49 PM, ean@s... writes:
>
> > Men all seem to have their shirts hanging out; nobody tucks them
in
> > anymore. Even dress shirts have gone the way of the polo? Don't
men want to show
> > their trim waist lines? I guess not if the pants are hanging so
low.
> >
Elizabeth was using the shirt-hanging-out as just one example of
the general sloppiness in dress that seems to have swept over this
country (the USA)-- and when I read her post I felt like commenting
that the sloppiness is just a part and expression of a much more
decadent (for lack of a better word) modern (or post-modern?)
attitude toward the presentation of self, also expressed through the
ubiquitous practice of tatooing and piercing of body parts (visible
or not), as well as in the systematic use of obscenities in speech.
> See - this is what I hate about fashion dictates. They're all based
on the
> assumption that everyone on earth is thin.
But there are no "fashion dictates" in the old sense.
The "fashion" these days is the sloppiness described above. I'm not
talking about "high fashion" (clothes seen in fashion mags, which are
fantasy stuff unwearable by most ordinary people) but fashion in the
sense of what most people actually wear. Overweight people (women
especially),which is about one person out of three, parade their fat
in tight fitting outfits as though they were proud of it. And talking
about "tucking in the shirt thang" as you call it, everyday I see men
with shirts tucked in over an enormous gut that hangs over the belt
of pants 2 or 3 sizes too small in the waist. So tucked in or hanging
out the problem is the same.
Elizabeth, I, for one, don't have a
> trim waistline. And the tucking in the shirt thang is pure fascism.
Isn't this use of "fascism" a bit loose?!
>
> Of course, comfort rarely seems to be an issue with fashion
dictates.
> Comtemporary film may be unstylish or undressed but classical
Hollywood cinema can be
> downright uncomfortable to watch/ponder, esp. if any portion of the
film
> takes place in the summer. No golden era should have anyone wearing
a three-piece
> suit and a hat or heels, hose and makeup in stifling heat.
>
It looks uncomfortable to you because we have become so used to
sloppy dressing. You sound like Lina Lamont in "Singin' in the Rain"
Re the heavy wig she must wear in the period movie she's starring
in. "Everybody used to wear them," the director tells her. "Then
everybody was a dope," she retorts. Yes it always looks funny to me
when I see men in old movies going fishing or on a picnic or some
outdoor activity wearing three-piece suits, but "Everybody used to
wear them." And no decent woman would go out without hat and gloves
and heels and makeup. And it would not be a "golden era" of the
cinema if people in those old movies walked around in T-shirts and
jeans and untucked shirts and sporting tatoos and rings in their
noses and lips.
> Let's face it - the purpose of dressing stylishly is so that you
can move
> through the capitalist machine more smoothly. A tucked in shirt
arbitrarily, like
> all signs, connotes success, authority, professionalism. And it's
that
> arbitrariness, built on thinness as a standard, that I find
objectionable.
Again, the topic was not being "stylish" but simply avoiding
sloppiness. But since you're talking semiotics, then the reverse of
your statement is true: a non-tucked in shirt connotes failure, lack
of authority and unprofessionalism. Unless you totally rebel against
the "capitalist machine" (which is perfectly honorable -- actually
sloppy dressing was born of the hippie rebellion of the late sixties)
you have to take the consequences.
>
> So I'll lost some weight. I'll deal with it. But I'll always bitch
about it.
>
Now you're talking!! When you have lost it and can tuck in your
shirt, do send "before/after" pictures to Elizabeth. You'll be proud
of yourself.
JPC
>
>
> [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
10464
From: Adrian Martin
Date: Tue Jun 1, 2004 2:18pm
Subject: Gainsbourg DVD-set
Dear friends - All devoted Gainsbourgians in the group should immediately
acquire (if they don't already have it) the French DVD set devoted mainly to
his music: all the clips, TV spots, short docos, a selection of interviews,
etc, including a couple of choice items he directed himself. There is much
amazing stuff here, including a lovely duet with Anna Karina.
It seems pretty hard to get copies of Gainsbourg's directed features (four
in all) beyond the first one. I am dying to see CHARLOTTE FOR EVER! I always
thought it was a pity Serge never collaborated in a significant way with a
major French director - apologies to any diehard fans of Claude Berri or Luc
Besson among us! Godard immortalised songs by Jean Ferrat and Leo Ferré
(indeed, I became a fan of both of them through hearing their music in his
films), but Gainsbourg and the Nouvelle Vague was alas, a 'missed encounter'
... It took the Serge revival of the 90s, and bands like Air, to get his
songs into films by Assayas and others. And Resnais' SAME OLD SONG makes
heartbreaking use of a snippet from 'I've Come to Tell You It's Goodbye'.
POSITIF did a fantastic interview with Gainsbourg where he talked, among
many other topics, of his love for Kubrick's films.
Adrian
10465
From: David Ehrenstein
Date: Tue Jun 1, 2004 2:26pm
Subject: Re: Gainsbourg DVD-set
This is great news for Gainsbourgians everywhere --
especially Tosh Berman, who's on this list but hasn't
checked in recently.
--- Adrian Martin wrote:
> Dear friends - All devoted Gainsbourgians in the
> group should immediately
> acquire (if they don't already have it) the French
> DVD set devoted mainly to
> his music: all the clips, TV spots, short docos, a
> selection of interviews,
> etc, including a couple of choice items he directed
> himself. There is much
> amazing stuff here, including a lovely duet with
> Anna Karina.
>
> It seems pretty hard to get copies of Gainsbourg's
> directed features (four
> in all) beyond the first one. I am dying to see
> CHARLOTTE FOR EVER! I always
> thought it was a pity Serge never collaborated in a
> significant way with a
> major French director - apologies to any diehard
> fans of Claude Berri or Luc
> Besson among us! Godard immortalised songs by Jean
> Ferrat and Leo Ferré
> (indeed, I became a fan of both of them through
> hearing their music in his
> films), but Gainsbourg and the Nouvelle Vague was
> alas, a 'missed encounter'
> ... It took the Serge revival of the 90s, and bands
> like Air, to get his
> songs into films by Assayas and others. And Resnais'
> SAME OLD SONG makes
> heartbreaking use of a snippet from 'I've Come to
> Tell You It's Goodbye'.
>
> POSITIF did a fantastic interview with Gainsbourg
> where he talked, among
> many other topics, of his love for Kubrick's films.
>
> Adrian
>
>
__________________________________
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10466
From: Elizabeth Anne Nolan
Date: Tue Jun 1, 2004 2:26pm
Subject: Re: stylish clothing
--- In a_film_by@yahoogroups.com, "Elizabeth Anne Nolan" wrote:
> Men all seem to have their shirts hanging out; nobody
> tucks them in anymore. Even dress shirts have gone
> the way of the polo? Don't men want to show their
> trim waist lines? I guess not if the pants are hanging
> so low.
I believe as written, 'Don't men want to show show their trim
waist lines?' was about the MEN WHO HAD trim waist lines not
wanting to show them. It may be "fascist" for a trim waist line
to be admired in either male or female, but it also healthy
(dismissing bulemia, drug ravaged bodies, etc). Indeed, the
'hanging low pants' of the teens and young adults is a gutless /
hipless phenomenon. Perhaps that is the new fashion
statement of a trim waistline... guess I wasn't looking close
enough.
10467
From: jpcoursodon
Date: Tue Jun 1, 2004 2:47pm
Subject: Re: Gainsbourg DVD-set
--- In a_film_by@yahoogroups.com, Adrian Martin wrote:
>
> POSITIF did a fantastic interview with Gainsbourg where he talked,
among
> many other topics, of his love for Kubrick's films.
>
> Adrian
The interview was in the february 1987 issue (#312) and I just re-
read it yesterday when the discussion here came to Gainsbourg.. There
was also a very good review of "Charlotte for ever" by the late
Gerard Legrand and a very detailed filmography, plus a
fascinating "Synopsis" by Serge of "Charlotte".
JPC
10468
From: Elizabeth Anne Nolan
Date: Tue Jun 1, 2004 3:01pm
Subject: Re: stylish clothing/fashion fascism/Arzner
I agree that the dictates of fashion can be very uniform-making
(that's as far as I want to go with fascism), but I also think
cost is often the primary determinant of dress in two polar
ways. Some go for the cheapest, others for the most
expensive (regardless of style); sometimes, regardless
of checkbook either way.
The men and women dressed in suits in the 40's and 50's
were not only signaling their success in the tremendous
upward and urban mobility trends of those times, but also
probably had just one good functional suit. (My parents each
came from large working class families and the family portraits
are of suited young adults.) The SUIT was the uniform of
achievement. Then, people dressed upward; today, downward.
THE DAY THE EARTH STOOD STILL has those same 'suited' people.
I have been thinking about what sort of things are implied in
movies by "uniforms" (outside of the military / police) that are
just absent today. Walk though a hospital, and tell me
who is the doctor; school, teacher. Try to find someone who
works in a department store... how many times do you ask
someone "DO YOU WORK HERE?" Sure, the movies show
these people wearing the Home Depot, Cosco bibs, but
do they really wear them in the real world? And what does
the audience think when they see those work place uniforms?
... PRODUCT PLACEMENT!
Thanks for pointing out ARZNER; I've read/heard her name enough;
will look for Judith Mayne's Directed by Dorothy Arzner.
10469
From: Jaime N. Christley
Date: Tue Jun 1, 2004 3:33pm
Subject: Re: clothing and appearance
I do think we are approaching consistency/texture of lint as far as
going off-topic. Oh well.
When I am concerned about comfort but not appearance, I wear
comfortable clothes.
When I am concerned about appearance, I go in that direction. It's
an investment, like making sure your car is running properly, has air
in its tires, fresh oil, etc. Like making sure your insurance is
paid up, the kids have good dental care. It's an ongoing "life
maintenance" that comes as a result of agreeing to live in
contemporary American society. To associate it with fascism is a bit
extreme. There is no branch of the criminal justice system to deal
with "fashion offenders." The phrase "fashion police" is a figure of
speech.
On the other hand, a sloppy uniform in the US armed forces is
discouraged and there are minor punishments ranging from docking your
pay to serving extra duty. In Sam Fuller's autobiography, he talks
about a soldier who was shot for having his shirt tucked in wrong.
But then again, this uniform violation revealed him to be a German
soldier in disguise. There are similar expectations in all uniformed
jobs, from the post office to McDonald's. As a temp worker I have
the opportunity to observe that in the New York business community,
there is also a uniform code, but it's programmed to give the
participants an enormous amount of latitude: color, brand, pattern,
material, etc. In midtown I am expected to wear a tie, a dress
shirt, black or brown shoes, and a suit. One firm may be more
fashion-conscious than another. Cuff-links are pleasing to some but
not essential. In some locations, like in Soho, I am expected *not*
to wear a tie, but to wear professional attire like a dress shirt,
non-suit trousers (kakhi, nylon, etc), black/brown shoes.
If I went to work, and everyone I saw, or even a small percentage of
them, had their shirt hanging out, or they wore sneakers to an office
where one doesn't wear sneakers, or something - THEN I might start
writing doomsday messages. But not yet.
(I can't comment on celebrities. These are cases where it's fashion
for show, and for all I know they could start going to talk shows
stark naked and it wouldn't affect the majority of working people in
America, other than giving them something to talk about over the
water cooler.)
-Jaime
10470
From: jpcoursodon
Date: Tue Jun 1, 2004 4:19pm
Subject: Re: clothing and appearance
--- In a_film_by@yahoogroups.com, "Jaime N. Christley"
wrote:
> I do think we are approaching consistency/texture of lint as far as
> going off-topic. Oh well.
>
Sometimes off-topic stuff is more fun than on-topic stuff...
However I don't think the discussion about clothing worn in the past
(and old movies) was off topic. There is a close relationship between
the strict dress codes of the '30s, '40s and '50s and the equally
strict production code that ruled Hollywood in those days. Clothes
are never non-significant.
Think (among countless examples) of the considerable significance
and import of wearing or not wearing a girdle in "Anatomy of a
Murder."
By the way I just checked my navel: no lint there.
"Now I wouldn't presume to tell a woman
What a woman ought to think,
But if she has to think: "Think Pink!"
JPC
> When I am concerned about comfort but not appearance, I wear
> comfortable clothes.
>
> When I am concerned about appearance, I go in that direction. It's
> an investment, like making sure your car is running properly, has
air
> in its tires, fresh oil, etc. Like making sure your insurance is
> paid up, the kids have good dental care. It's an ongoing "life
> maintenance" that comes as a result of agreeing to live in
> contemporary American society. To associate it with fascism is a
bit
> extreme. There is no branch of the criminal justice system to deal
> with "fashion offenders." The phrase "fashion police" is a figure
of
> speech.
>
> On the other hand, a sloppy uniform in the US armed forces is
> discouraged and there are minor punishments ranging from docking
your
> pay to serving extra duty. In Sam Fuller's autobiography, he talks
> about a soldier who was shot for having his shirt tucked in wrong.
> But then again, this uniform violation revealed him to be a German
> soldier in disguise. There are similar expectations in all
uniformed
> jobs, from the post office to McDonald's. As a temp worker I have
> the opportunity to observe that in the New York business community,
> there is also a uniform code, but it's programmed to give the
> participants an enormous amount of latitude: color, brand,
pattern,
> material, etc. In midtown I am expected to wear a tie, a dress
> shirt, black or brown shoes, and a suit. One firm may be more
> fashion-conscious than another. Cuff-links are pleasing to some
but
> not essential. In some locations, like in Soho, I am expected
*not*
> to wear a tie, but to wear professional attire like a dress shirt,
> non-suit trousers (kakhi, nylon, etc), black/brown shoes.
>
> If I went to work, and everyone I saw, or even a small percentage
of
> them, had their shirt hanging out, or they wore sneakers to an
office
> where one doesn't wear sneakers, or something - THEN I might start
> writing doomsday messages. But not yet.
>
> (I can't comment on celebrities. These are cases where it's
fashion
> for show, and for all I know they could start going to talk shows
> stark naked and it wouldn't affect the majority of working people
in
> America, other than giving them something to talk about over the
> water cooler.)
>
> -Jaime
10471
From: Jaime N. Christley
Date: Tue Jun 1, 2004 4:27pm
Subject: Re: clothing and appearance
> Sometimes off-topic stuff is more fun than on-topic stuff...
> However I don't think the discussion about clothing worn in the
past
> (and old movies) was off topic. There is a close relationship
between
> the strict dress codes of the '30s, '40s and '50s and the equally
> strict production code that ruled Hollywood in those days. Clothes
> are never non-significant.
Sure, I'll buy that. I don't mind off-topic, anyway...why fight it,
etc. After all, I contributed my two cents.
-Jaime
10472
From: hotlove666
Date: Tue Jun 1, 2004 4:43pm
Subject: Werner Schroeter
> > > Bene was the Italian Werner Schoreter -- with just as
> > > much luck in getting a U.S. release for his films.
Since Yahoo the Magnificent ate my Schroeter post, here it is again:
There are many Werner Schroeters, all great, but the one I'm furious
at not being able to see again is the Italian one: Reign of Naples
(1978) is an Italian generational film with a normal budget which
Daney loved. It is really what 1900 wanted to be, and more. There's
another "normal" Schroeter from the same period, Palermo oder
Wolfsburg (1980), about a young Sicilian worker emigrating to Germany
looking for employment. These films, which I saw once each at UCLA,
are among the very best films of that period. His recent films focus
on opera and are more conceptual, because he rarely gets good
budgets, but I think he's one of the very best filmmakers around. I
met him in Berkeley, and he's also a standout among the German
fimmakers of his generation because of his self-effacing niceness.
10473
From: hotlove666
Date: Tue Jun 1, 2004 4:52pm
Subject: Anniversary free-for-all
> I'm planning to use our group's first anniversary to put up some
new
> stills from a different filmmaker, though past homepage pictures
will
> remain available in the files section. But how else should we
celebrate
> June 13th? Perhaps a wild free for all party in chat with David and
JPC
> and Bill K and all of our chattiest members going at it at once?
>
> - Fred C.
I don't know about David, but "I'm kind of tired of both of us." I
think it would be interesting to do what you propose with some of the
young members who've been lurking less and posting more lately. As I
commented to Andy Rector, who is one of them, they're easy to spot --
they inevitably make their debut pissed off and casting aspersions in
all directions. I think they are what this group is all about. If
there was some way we could all listen in, that would be fun. Then
The Old Ones could comment later -- and certainly would!
10474
From:
Date: Tue Jun 1, 2004 1:38pm
Subject: fashion bullying/Milestone/Crawford
In a message dated 6/1/04 9:36:28 AM, jpcoursodon@y... writes:
> And talking about "tucking in the shirt thang" as you call it, everyday I
> see men with shirts tucked in over an enormous gut that hangs over the belt of
> pants 2 or 3 sizes too small in the waist. So tucked in or hanging out the
> problem is the same.
>
No, it's not because you never gave an example of how an untucked shirt makes
a gut look better (not good, better).
Yes, yes the fascism bit was used too loosely. But while, as Jamie says, "
there is no branch of the criminal justice system to deal with 'fashion
offenders' (and) the phrase 'fashion police' is a figure of speech," there is that show
Style Court. And the combined effect of all those fashion makeover shows (not
to mention face-to-face admonishments) is to get you to police yourself.
Power exists in more than criminal justice systems, elementary Foucault that. It
all has a bullying (is that better?) effect on me.
<
signaling their success in the tremendous upward and urban mobility trends of those
times, but also probably had just one good functional suit.>>
But in the tremendous DOWNWARD trends of THESE times, shouldn't the dress
reflect that?
<
dressing.>>
But are we 1000% certain that the three-piece suit in 100 degree weather was
considered comfy? Or did the comfort in conforming to this standard mitigate
the gallons of sweat? Are there any classical Hollywood films where a character
commits the grievous sin of taking off their jacket or hat in stifling heat?
Lewis Milestone's (or is that Joan Crawford's) Rain is all I can think of at
the moment but that doesn't really count. Still, it may have been an early
indictment of fashion bullying given how both the weather and dress are
practically central characters. No wonder it was a flop. It's my second fave Crawford.
<
send "before/after" pictures to Elizabeth. You'll be proud of yourself.>>
No I won't. Look, I do want to buy in. I'll be teaching for the first time in
August and I will try my damnedest to look authoritative and professional.
But I'll always be wondering if this person who is nice to me now would have
given the time of day to the untucked, big-gutted me. And Fredric Jameson will be
mad at me. And my superego, whose name is Adorno, will roll its eyes and ask
"What else is new?" And Marx will spin in his grave...
Kevin John
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
10475
From: jpcoursodon
Date: Tue Jun 1, 2004 5:53pm
Subject: Re: Anniversary free-for-all
--- In a_film_by@yahoogroups.com, "hotlove666"
wrote:
>
> > I'm planning to use our group's first anniversary to put up some
> new
> > stills from a different filmmaker, though past homepage pictures
> will
> > remain available in the files section. But how else should we
> celebrate
> > June 13th? Perhaps a wild free for all party in chat with David
and
> JPC
> > and Bill K and all of our chattiest members going at it at once?
> >
> > - Fred C.
>
> I don't know about David, but "I'm kind of tired of both of us." I
> think it would be interesting to do what you propose with some of
the
> young members who've been lurking less and posting more lately. As
I
> commented to Andy Rector, who is one of them, they're easy to spot -
-
> they inevitably make their debut pissed off and casting aspersions
in
> all directions. I think they are what this group is all about. If
> there was some way we could all listen in, that would be fun. Then
> The Old Ones could comment later -- and certainly would!
I don't think David will ever get tired of chatting and quipping
and gossiping. But I like Bill's idea. Also, I would like to hear
from the dozens of people who have never posted -- must be close to a
hundred. I'm curious to know who they are, why they joined the Group,
what they get from it, what they like or dislike about it etc... And
why they just lurk. (could they be intimidated by the staggering
erudition of some of the more frequent posters?)
JPC
10476
From: jpcoursodon
Date: Tue Jun 1, 2004 6:05pm
Subject: Re: fashion bullying/Milestone/Crawford
--- In a_film_by@yahoogroups.com, LiLiPUT1@a... wrote:
>
> In a message dated 6/1/04 9:36:28 AM, jpcoursodon@y... writes:
>
>
> > And talking about "tucking in the shirt thang" as you call it,
everyday I
> > see men with shirts tucked in over an enormous gut that hangs
over the belt of
> > pants 2 or 3 sizes too small in the waist. So tucked in or
hanging out the
> > problem is the same.
> >
> No, it's not because you never gave an example of how an untucked
shirt makes
> a gut look better (not good, better).
>
There is no way to make a gut look better (except perhaps a very
stiff corset). The answer is: no gut.
> Yes, yes the fascism bit was used too loosely. But while, as Jamie
says, "
> there is no branch of the criminal justice system to deal
with 'fashion
> offenders' (and) the phrase 'fashion police' is a figure of
speech," there is that show
> Style Court. And the combined effect of all those fashion makeover
shows (not
> to mention face-to-face admonishments) is to get you to police
yourself.
> Power exists in more than criminal justice systems, elementary
Foucault that. It
> all has a bullying (is that better?) effect on me.
It may have that effect on you but my point was that for
countless millions or Americans it has no effect at all. They're
overweight and sloppily dressed and even seem proud of it, or at
least don't give a damn.
>
>
>
> <
sloppy
> dressing.>>
>
> But are we 1000% certain that the three-piece suit in 100 degree
weather was
> considered comfy?
It was not, but as i said before, there was nothing else you could
wear. Just like those 17th century wigs. "Comfy" was wearing slippers
at home while reading one's newspaper (but still wearing the suit
most of the time).
Or did the comfort in conforming to this standard mitigate
> the gallons of sweat?
Probably. And there was no air conditioning either...
Are there any classical Hollywood films where a character
> commits the grievous sin of taking off their jacket or hat in
stifling heat? YES Bogart in the hot house at the beginning of "The
Big Sleep".
>
JPC
Lewis Milestone's (or is that Joan Crawford's) Rain is all I can
think of at
> the moment but that doesn't really count. Still, it may have been
an early
> indictment of fashion bullying given how both the weather and dress
are
> practically central characters. No wonder it was a flop. It's my
second fave Crawford.
>
> Kevin John
>
>
>
>
> [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
10477
From: Paul Gallagher
Date: Tue Jun 1, 2004 6:13pm
Subject: Re: Bill/Paul praised! Rockism in film? Seth welcomed!
--- In a_film_by@yahoogroups.com, Joseph Kaufman wrote:
> I'd love to see it, at least. Along these lines, should the 1967
> Brigitte Bardot musical TV special come your way, it's wonderful.
> Lots of Gainsbourg in there, including "Bonnie and Clyde", from which
> Faye Dunaway adapted her look in the Penn film. It's all enough to
> make you forget Bardot's current politics for an hour. (It's on a
> PAL region 0 compilation called DIVINE B.B.)
> --
>
> - Joe Kaufman
I have a few scenes from the show online:
http://66.108.51.239/Brigitte%20Bardot%20%26%20Serge%20Gainsbourg%20-%20Bon=
nie%20%26%20Clyde.mpg
http://66.108.51.239/Brigitte%20Bardot%20-%20Harley%20Davidson%20(Francois%=
20Reichenbach).mpg
http://66.108.51.239/Brigitte%20Bardot%20And%20Serge%20Gainsbourg%20-%20Com=
ic%20Strip%20-%20(Show%20Bardot).mpg
The download will take a long time. This is my computer at home.
There is also a copy I put on a friend's web site:
http://www.gigiinc.net/share/Brigitte%20Bardot%20&%20Serge%20Gainsbourg%20-=
%20Bonnie%20&%20Clyde.mpg
I think these were directed by François Reichenbach.
This reminds me of the Kael discussion -- in part because Kael's
attack on Welles partly inspired "F for Fake," and also because her
attack on Brigitte Bardot and others is praised as a great work
of "amateur sociology," but in my view shows how she seems unable
to conceive that other people might honestly respond differently from
her.
Raymond Durgnat discusses Kael's "Fantasies of the Art House
Audience" in his essay, "How Not to Enjoy the Movies."
Kael describes Bardot, Gina Lollobrigida, Marilyn Monroe,
Carole Lombard, etc., as 'hideous, grotesque, degraded', and Kael
believes that "the intellectuals" who look at them either enjoy
degrading women to a 'low, animal' level or are homosexuals
ridiculing their rivals. Kael states that Marilyn Monroe and
Bardot's appeal is that they are "slovenly": "The average American is
a social worker at heart; he feels especially sympathetic
towards these slovenly ladies because their slovenliness marks
them as misfits."
This is at variance with my experience.
Here are Kael's comments. Despite their occassional feminist tone,
I wonder whether they show a hatred toward women. (And note the
implict attack on Hitchcock and Preminger toward the end.)
FANTASIES OF THE ART-HOUSE AUDIENCE
What struck me about these books [Eroticism in the Cinema,
Hollywood Babylon], which function as entertainment to what
might be called
highbrows, was that their chic seemed to consist largely in a
degradation of the female image. The stars and starlets are
displayed
at their most grotesque, just as they are in the cheapest
American publications (in fact the photos are probably derived
from those sorces). This female image is a parody of woman -
lascivious face, wet open mouth, gigantic drooping breasts.
She has no character, no individuality: she's blonde or
brunette or redhead, as one might consume a martini, an
old-fashioned, or a gin and tonic.
[Durgnat comments that "Eroticism in the Cinema" contains stills
from films by Pabst, Visconti, Becker, Antonioni, Hitchcock,
Ophuls, Bunuel, etc.]
Now I am told that even the junior-high-school boys of America use
photographs like these as pinups, and that this is their
idea of the desirable female. I don't believe it. I would guess
that they pretend to this ideal because they're afraid they won't
be considered manly and sexy if they admit they find this image
disgusting. I don't believe that these photographs are erotic in
any ordinary sense. I think that the grotesqueness of this female
image is what people enjoy. Here are some possible reasons.
First, these spongy, subhuman sex images reduce women to the
lowest animal level. And in the modern world, where women
are competent, independent, and free and equal, the men have
a solid, competitive hostility - they want to see women de
graded even lower than they were in the Victorian era. Here is
woman reduced to nothing but a blob that will gratify any male
impulse. And, of course, a woman who has no interest in life but
love presents no challenge to the male ego. Second, there's the
old split between sacred and profane love - and many men feel
that the more degraded the female, the more potent they would
become. Third, there's the vast homosexual audience which enjoys
derision of the female. I would guess, and here's a big
generalization, that more homosexuals than heterosexuals love to
chortle over the nude photos of Anita Ekberg. She's so
preposterous - a living satire of the female. It's my guess that the
audience for nudie-cutie magazines uses them in much the same
way the wealthy and educated use expensive French publications
on the same theme: they want to laugh at the subjects and/or
feel superior to them...
Monroe ... and Bardot are objects of enthusiasm not so much for
their (former or present) polymorphous-perverse physical charms and
their
(former or present) comedy talents, as for their messy, confused
public-private lives - the nervous breakdowns, miscarriages, over
weight problems, husband troubles, and all those mental and
physical ills which now comprise the image of a great star. The
new heroine of our films is becoming the wretched star herself.
In the pre-Freudian age, the exploitation of personal ailments
in films like The Misfits and La Verite would have been regarded
as disgusting. It is disgusting, and the condescending
type of sympathetic "understanding" which is now widely purveyed
is an insult to Freud and man...
The educated American is a social worker at heart: be feels
especially sympathetic toward these slovenly ladies because their
slovenliness marks them as misfits who couldn't function in his
orderly world. The same man who is enchanted with Monroe in
the seduction scene of Some Like It Hot -crawling all over
Tony Curtis while hanging out of her dress both fore and aft -
expects his girl friends or wife to be trim, slender and well
groomed. The decor in the homes and offices of the American
professional classes is clean and functional - Scandinavian with
a guilty dash of Japanese (as reparation for the bomb, we sit
close to the earth). Upon occasion, the American will desert the
art house for an American picture, particularly if it is advertised
with the intellectually fashionable decor. For this decor is an
article of faith: it is progressive and important; it calls business
men and artists to conferences at Aspen, where it is linked with
discussions of such topics as "Man the Problem Solver." And so
American movies now often come, packaged as it were, with
several minutes of ingenious, abstract, eye-catching titles. This
send-off - the graphics look provided by Saul Bass and other de
signers - has virtually nothing to do with the style or mood of
the picture, but it makes the movie look more modern. (How
can the picture be dismissed as trash when it looks like your own
expensive living room?)
10478
From: Paul Gallagher
Date: Tue Jun 1, 2004 6:31pm
Subject: Re: Bill/Paul praised! Rockism in film? Seth welcomed!
--- In a_film_by@yahoogroups.com, "Paul Gallagher"
wrote:
>
> I have a few scenes from the show online:
>
There links don't seem to work...
try these:
http://66.108.51.239/Bardot-Bonnie.mpg
http://66.108.51.239/Bardot-Comic.mpg
http://66.108.51.239/bardot-harley.mpg
http://www.gigiinc.net/share/Bardot-Bonnie.mpg
Paul
10479
From: Elizabeth Nolan
Date: Tue Jun 1, 2004 3:48pm
Subject: 10 On Ten or the 83 MINUTE FILM SCHOOL
I LIKED 10, which I saw in Palm Springs, 2004 and look forward to "10
on TEN"
http://www.screendaily.com/story.asp?storyid=17896&r=true
Elizabeth
10480
From: David Ehrenstein
Date: Tue Jun 1, 2004 6:42pm
Subject: Re: Re: Bill/Paul praised! Rockism in film? Seth welcomed!
--- Paul Gallagher wrote:
Quoting Kael:
"I would guess, and here's
> a big
> generalization, that more homosexuals than
> heterosexuals love to
> chortle over the nude photos of Anita Ekberg.
> She's so
> preposterous - a living satire of the female."
This is Pauline at her very lowest. Durgnat's essay
made hash of her ina most gentlemanly style.
But I'm not a gentleman. Therefore it's necessary to
remind everyone that Kael's attempt at a "Triumph of
the Will & Grace" alliance with James Broughton
produced a daughter -- and decades of bitterness on
the part of her ever-so-briefly-enchanted paramour.
In fact I would go so far as to say there's a distinct
element of penance for ever so much as knowing Kael in
Broughton's cinematic career from the 1960's on.
Welles was incredibly gay-friendly -- Reichenbach
being one in a long, long list of gay collaborators
stretching from the very beginning of his career.
__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Friends. Fun. Try the all-new Yahoo! Messenger.
http://messenger.yahoo.com/
10481
From: Jaime N. Christley
Date: Tue Jun 1, 2004 6:59pm
Subject: Re: fashion bullying/Milestone/Crawford
> Power exists in more than criminal justice systems, elementary
> Foucault that.
Common sense even. I think I'd have to be a damn fool not to agree
with that.
But how we value a power structure is decided by how much we value
the results it achieves and how little we regret its expenses.
(Notwithstanding our own personal deficit as regards our capability
of regretting a loss in the first place.)
Take those reality shows: Since most or all of them are about
ignoring or shitting on basic human dignity (an expense)
while "achieving" a few laughs, and arguably little else (a gain), it
seems clear that they are Bad. Wasteful, spiteful, literally good
for nothing.
> It all has a bullying (is that better?) effect on me.
Well you know what Dostoevsky said about American television programs!
-Jaime
10482
From: Paul Gallagher
Date: Tue Jun 1, 2004 7:37pm
Subject: Re: Rockism explained! Kael mentioned!
--- In a_film_by@yahoogroups.com, "hotlove666" wrote:
> that back in a nice e-mail, but I think he may still have a bit of
> the academic prejudice against auteurism -- which is finally going
> away according to one of the Harvard faculty, speaking during the
> amazingly heated exchange that followed my innocent remark.
>
I spent a lot of time at the Harvard Film Archive in the 1980's,
which had good programming but poor quality prints. However, I was
never interested in the faculty, not even Stanley Cavell.
My impression is that Vlada Petric, the curator of the Archive,
was an old-fashioned formalist a la Arnheim -- which makes it
interesting both that the programming was so strong and the
print quality was so bad... (Again my impression, possibly wrong,
is that Petric placed a great emphasis on elementary
technique -- after a screening of Straub and Huillet's "The
Bridegroom, the Actress, and the Pimp," he complained
that Straub and Huillet hadn't properly focused their
camera -- something I didn't really care about. He also
complained that there was a hidden edit in the opening tracking
shot (he added he knew that street very well) --
which he considered a violation of Straub and Huillet's principles --
which seems like a more interesting point, but I don't know
that German street or Straub and Huillet's principles well enough
to comment.)
The one Harvard film studies student I spoke with dismissed
most narrative film as "canned theater," which I disagreed with.
Anyway -- here's an interesting list... I think there's
something fundamentally wrong here, even though all of these
films are worth seeing, but I can't quite describe what's wrong...
maybe I'd ask, "Where is the love?"
FILMS AND VIDEO TO SEE
HARVARD UNIVERSITY VES DEPARTMENT
MARCH 1997
*Note*
What This List Is And What It Is Not:
The faculty of Visual and Environmental Studies have drafted
the following list of titles which concentrators with a
primary interest in film or video should try to see during
their undergraduate years. This is not a list of
cinema's greatest hits or of the best movies of all time.
Rather, it reflects a variety of criteria. Some works we
consider great, others important, others influential.
Not every title on the list represents a unanimous choice.
We plan to revise the list periodically and welcome you comments and
suggestions.
The House Divided, Guy, '13, US
The Birth Of A Nation, Griffith, '15, US
Intolerance, Griffith, '16, US
The Cabinet Of Dr. Caligari, Weine, '19, Ger
Nosferatu, Murnau, 21, Ger
The Blot, Weber, 21, US
The Last Laugh, Murnau, 24, Ger
Greed, Von Stroheim, 24, US
Sherlock Junior, Keaton, 24, US
Battleship Potemkin, Eisenstein, 25, USSR
The Gold Rush, Chaplin, 25, US
Body And Soul, Micheaux, 25, US
The General, Keaton, 26, US
Page Of Madness, Kinugasa, 26, Jap
Metropolis, Lang, 26, Ger
The End Of St. Petersburg, Pudovkin, 27, USSR
Napoleon, Gance, 27, Fr
Sunrise, Murnau, 27, US
October, Eisenstein, 27-8, USSR
Our Daily Bread, Murnau, 28, US
The Crowd, Vidor, 28, US
Pandora's Box, Pabst, 28-9, Ger
The Passion Of Joan Of Arc, Dreyer, 28, Fr
Earth, Dovzhenko, 30, USSR
L'age D'or, Bunuel, 30, Fr
M, Lang, 31, Ger
The Exile, Michaux, 31, US
Trouble In Paradise, Lubitsch, 32, US
I Am A Fugitive From A Chain Gang, Leroy, 32, US
Ten Minutes To Live, Michaux, 32, US
Zero De Conduite, Vigo, 33, Fr
Christopher Strong, Arzner, 33, US
El Compadre Mendoza, De Fuentes, 33, Mex
L'atalante, Vigo, 34, Fr
Land Without Bread, Bunuel, 34, Sp
It Happened One Night, Capra, 34, US
The Scarlett Empress, Von Sternberg, 34, US
A Night At The Opera, Marx Brothers, 35, US
The Crime Of M. Lange, Renoir, 35, Fr
The 39 Steps, Hitchcock, 35, GB
Midern Times, Chaplin, 36, US
Sisters of the Gion, Mizoguchi, 36, Jap
Grand Illusion, Renoir, 37, Fr
Bringing Up Baby, Hawks, 38, US
Alexander Nevsky, Eisenstein, 38, USSR
Le Jour Se Leve, Carne, 39, Fr
Mr. Smith Goes To Washington, Capra, 39, US
Stagecoach, Ford, 39, US
The Rules Of The Game, Renoir, 39, Fr
Gone With The Wind, Flemming, 39, US
The Wizard Of Oz, Flemming, 39, US
Philadelphia Story, Cukor, 40, US
His Girl Friday, Hawks, 40, US
Thief Of Bagdad, Powell, 40, GB
Sullivan's Travels, Sturges, 41, US
Citizen Kane, Welles, 41, US
The Blood Of Jesus, Williams, 41, US
Ivan The Terrible, Part 1, Eisenstein, 43-4, USSR
Day Of Wrath, Dreyer, 43, Den
Children Of Paradise, Carne, 45, Fr
Rome Open City, Rossellini, 45, It
Paisan, Rossellini, 46, It
The Big Sleep, Hawks, 46, US
The Lady In The Lake, Montgomery, 47, US
La Terra Trema, Visconti, 48, It
Bicycle Thieves, De Sica, 49, It
Diary Of A Country Priest, Bresson, 50, Fr
Los Olvidados, Bunuel, 50, Mex
Rashomon, Kurosawa, 50, Jap
Outrage, Lupino, 52, US
The Earrings Of Madame De, Ophuls, 53, Fr
Tokyo Story, Ozu, 53, Jap
The Wages Of Fear, Coluzot, 53, Fr
Ugetsu Monogatari, Mizoguchi, 53, Jap
Monsieur Hulot's Birthday, Tati, 53, Fr
The Big Heat, Lang, 53, US
Salt Of The Earth, Biberman, 53, US
Voyage In Italy, Rossellini, 53, It
The Little Fugitive, Ashley, 53, US
Seven Samurai, Kurosawa, 54, Jap
Sansho The Bailiff, Mizoguchi, 54, Jap
On The Waterfront, Kazan, 54, US
Ordet, Dreyer, 54, Den
La Strada, Fellini, 54, It
The Night Of The Hunter, Laughton, 55, US
Pather Panchali, Ray, 55, India
The Searchers, Ford, 56, US
Kanal, Wajda, 56, Poland
A Man Escaped, Bresson, 56, Fr
Wild Strawberries, Bergman, 56, Fr
Touch Of Evil, Welles, 57, US
Paths Of Glory, Kubrick, 57, US
Nights Of Cabiria, Fellini, 57, It
Pyaasa, Dutt, 57, India
Ashes And Diamonds, Wajda, 58, Pol
Vertigo, Hitchcock, 58, US
Ballad Of A Soilder, Chukrai, 59, USSR
Breathless, Godard, 59, Fr
Hiroshima Mon Amour, Resnais, 59, Fr
The Four Hundred Blows, Truffaur, 59, Fr
Some Like It Hot, Wilder, 59, US
Shadows, Cassavetes, 59, US
The World Of Apu, Ray, 59, Ind
L'avventura, Antonioni, 60, It
Mother Joan Of The Angels, Kawalerowicz, 60, Pol
Rocco And His Brothers, Visconti, 60, It
The Hidden Star, Ghatak, 60, Ind
Psycho, Hitchcock, 60, US
Accattone, Pasolini, 61, It
Last Year At Marienbad, Resnais, 61, Fr
The Island, Shindo, 61, Jap
Viridiana, Bunuel, 61, Sp
Cleo From 5 To 7, Varda, 61, Fr/It
The Connection, Clarke, 61, US
An Autumn Afternoon, Ozu, 62, Jap
The Eclipse, Antonioni, 62, It
La Jette, Marker, 62, Fr
8 1/2, Fellini, 62, It
The Leopard, Visconti, 63, It
Vidas Secas, Dos Santos, 63, Brazil
The Red Desert, Antonioni, 64, It
Dr. Strangelove, Kubrick, 64, US
The Gospel According To St. Matthew, Pasolini, 64, It
The Brig, Mekas, 64, US
Black Girl, Sembene, 65, Senegal
Pierrot Le Fou, Godard, 65, Fr/It
The Round-Up, Jancso, 65, Hun
The Shop On Main Street, Kadar, 65, Czech
Not Reconciled, Straub And Huiller, 65, WGer
Happiness, Varda, 65, Fr
The Battle Of Algiers, Pontecorvo, 66, It
Blow-Up, Antonioni, 66, GB
Daisies, Chytilova, 66, Czech
Au Hassard, Balthazar, Bresson, 66, Fr/Sw
Andrei Rublev, Tarkovski, 66, USsr
Two Or Three Things I Know About Her, Godard, 66, Fr
Persona, Bergman, 66, Sw
Hawks And Sparrows, Pasolini, 66, It
Playtime, Tati, 67, Fr
Bonnie And Clyde, Penn, 67, US
Land In Anguish, Rocha, 67, Brazil
I Even Met Happy Gypsies, Petrovic, 67, Yugo
Silence And Cry, Jancso, 68, Hun
2001: A Space Odyssey, Kubrick, 68, US
Death By Hanging, Oshima, 68, Jap
Memories Of Underdevelopment, Alea, 68, Cuba
The Conformist, Bertolucci, 69, It
The Night Of Counting The Years, Abdelsalam, 69, Uar
Easy Rider, Hopper, 69, US
Blood Of The Condor, Sanjines, 69, Bolivia
Antonio Das Mortes, Rocha, 69, Brazil
Lucia, Solas, 69, Cuba
The Jakal Of Nahualtoro, Littin, 69, Chile
King Lear, Kozintsev, 70, USsr
Sweet Sweetback's Badasssss Song, Van Peebles, 71, US
My Uncle Antoine, Jutra, 71, Can
Shaft, Parks, 71, US
How Tasty Was My Little Frenchman, Dos Santos, 72, Brazil
Aguirre, Wrath Of God, Herzog, 72, WGer
Last Tango In Paris, Bertolucci, 72, It/Fr
The Rat Trap, Gopalakrishnan, 72, Ind
The Spirit Of The Beehive, Erice, 73, Sp
Badlands, Malick, 73, US
The Mother And The Whore, Eustache, 73, Fr
India Song, Duras, 74, Fr
Xala, Sembene, 74, Senegal
The Conversation, Coppola, 74, US
Cria Cuervos, Saura, 75, Sp
Jeanne Dielman, Akerman, 75, Bel
Nashville, Altman, 75, US
Travelling Players, Angelopoulos, 75, Greece
Eraserhead, Lynch, 76, US
Kings Of The Road, Wenders, 76, WGer
Iphigenia, Cacoyannis, 76, Greece
The Ascent, Shepitko, 76, USsr
In The Realm Of The Senses, Oshima, 76, Fr/Jap
Car Wash, Schultz, 76, US
Jonah Who Will Be 25 In The Year 2000, Tanner, 76, Fr/Sw
Killer Of Sheep, Burnett, 77, US
Hypothesis Of The Stolen Painting, Ruiz, 78,Fr
The Marriage Of Maria Braun, Fassbinder, 78, WGer
The Two Of Them, Meszaros, 78, Hun
Apocalypse Now, Coppola, 79, US
Vengeance Is Mine, Imamura, 79, Jap
Raging Bull, Scorsese, 80, US
Germany, Pale Mother, Sanders-Brahms, 80, Ger
Zoot Suit, Valdez, 81, US
Chan Is Missing, Wang, 81, US
The German Sisters, Von Trotta, 81, WGer
The Draftsman's Contract, Greenaway, 82, GB
Ashes And Embers, Gerima, 82, US
Boat People, Hui, 82, Hk
A Question Of Silence, Gorris, 82, Nlds
The Wind, Cisse, 82, Mali
Yol, Guney, 82, Turkey
The Ballad Of Narayama, Imamura, 83, Jap
Once Upon A Time In America, Leone, 83, US
Yellow Earth, Kaige, 84, China
Illusions, Dash, 84, US
Camila, Bemberg, 84, Argentina/Sp
Ran, Kurosawa, 85, Fr/Jap
The Official Story, Puenzo, 85, Arg
Blue Velvet, Lynch, 86, US
Rosa Luxemburg, Von Trotta, 86, WGer
Yeelen, Cisse, 87, Mali
Red Sorghum, Yimou, 87, China
Wedding In Galilee, Khleifi, 87, Bel/Fr
Wings Of Desire, Wenders, 87, WGer/Fr
Salaam Bombay!, Nair, 88, Fr/Ind
Time Of The Gypsies, KUSturica, 89, Yugo
Freeze -- Die -- Come To Life, Kanevski, 89, USsr
Do The Right Thing, Lee, 89, US
Sweetie, Campion, 89, AUStralia
Yaaba, Ouedraogo, 89, Burkina Faso/Fr/Switz
The Killer, Woo, 89, Hk
The Match Factory Girl, Kaurismaki, Finland, 89
Looking For Langston, Julien, 89, GB
Speaking Parts, Egoyan, 89, GB
Tilai, Ouedraogo, 90, Burkina Faso/Fr/Switz
Ju Dou, Yimou, 90, China
Raise The Red Lantern, Yimou, 91, Ch
Young Soul Rebels, Julien, 91, GB
Daughters Of The Dust, Dash, 92, US
Life According To Agfa, Dayan, 92, Israel
Satanic Tango, Tarr, 94, Hun
Chung King Express, Wong, 94, Hk
Vive L'amour, Ming-Liang, 94, China/Taiwan
Hollywood Genres:
Musicals:
Love Me Tonight, Mamoulian, 32, US
Golddiggers Of 1933, Bacon And Berkeley, 33, US
Swing Time, Stevens, 36, US
Singin' In The Rain, Kelly And Donen, 52, US
Westerns:
Stagecoach, Ford, 39, US
Red River, Hawks, 48, US
Johnny Guitar, Ray, 54, US
The Man From Laramie, Mann, 55, US
The Searchers, Ford, 56, US
Forty Guns, Fuller, 57, US
Once Upon A Time In The West, Leone, 68, It
The Wild Bunch, Peckinpah, 69, US
Horror:
Dracula, Browning, 31, US
Bride Of Frankenstein, Whale, 35, US
Cat People, Tourner, 42, US
Psycho, Hitchcock, 60, US
Rosemary's Baby, Polanski, 68, US
Night Of The Living Dead, Romero, 69, US
The Shining, Kubrick, 80, US
Science Fiction:
The Day The Earth Stood Still, Wise, 51, US
Forbidden Plannet, Wilcox, 56, US
Invasion Of The Body Snatchers, Siegel, 56, US
Seconds, Frankenheimer, 66, US
Blade Runner, Scott, 82, US
Gangster:
Underworld, Von Sternberg, 27, US
The Public Enemy, Wellman, 31, US
Scarface, Hawks, 32, US
Angels With Dirty Faces, Curtiz, 38, US
White Heat, Walsch, 49, US
The Godfather, Coppola, 72, US
Romantic Melodrama/"Women's Pictures" Of The 1940's:
Blond VenUS, Von Sternberg, 32, US
Stella Dallas, Vidor, 37, US
Stage Door, La Cava, 37, US
Dance, Girl, Dance, Arzner, 40, US
Now, Voyager, Rapper, 42, US
Mildred Pierce, Curtiz, 45, US
Letter From An Unknown Woman, Ophuls, 48, US
Imitation Of Life, Sirk, 59, US
Film Noir:
Double Indemnity, Wilder, 44, US
Gilda, Vidor, 46, US
Criss Cross, Slodmak, 49, US
Gun Crazy, Lewis, 50, US
The Big Heat, Lang, 53, US
Kiss Me Deadly, Aldrich, 55, US
Chinatown, Polanski, 74, US
Mixed-Mode Filmmaking: Experimental Documentary & Essay Forms:
The War Game, Watkins, 65, GB
David Holzman's Diary, Mcbride, 67, US
Innocence Unprotected, Makavejev, 68, Yugo
W.R. Mysteries Of The Organism, Makavejev, 71, Yugo/WGer
Madame X, Ottinger, 77, Wge
Daughter-Rite, Citron, 78, US
Surname Viet Given Name Nam, Min-Ha, 89, US
Joan Of Arc Of Mongolia, Ottinger, 89, WGer
Feminist Filmmakers Of The Avant-Garde, US And Britain:
One Way Or Another, Gomez, 74-8, Cuba
Thriller, Potter, 79, GB
Born In Flames, Borden, 82, US
The Man Who Envied Women, Rainer, 85, US
Ties That Bind, Freidrich, 84, US
10483
From: Elizabeth Anne Nolan
Date: Tue Jun 1, 2004 7:58pm
Subject: HARVARD VES FILM LIST
--- In a_film_by@yahoogroups.com, "Paul Gallagher" wrote:
> Rather, it reflects a variety of criteria. Some works we
> consider great, others important, others influential.
Thanks for the listing... I'll send it to NETFLIX and the local
library.
Great and influential, I understand.
Important? To what end?
10484
From: Eric Henderson
Date: Tue Jun 1, 2004 8:34pm
Subject: Re: Anniversary free-for-all
--- "jpcoursodon" wrote:
>
> And why they just lurk. (could they be intimidated by the staggering
> erudition of some of the more frequent posters?)
>
Bingo. (Well, that and there's just too many damned message boards these
days.)
10485
From: Damien Bona
Date: Tue Jun 1, 2004 9:02pm
Subject: Re: fashion bullying/Milestone/Crawford
--- In a_film_by@yahoogroups.com, LiLiPUT1@a... wrote:
>
>
> But are we 1000% certain that the three-piece suit in 100 degree
weather was
> considered comfy? Or did the comfort in conforming to this standard
mitigate
> the gallons of sweat? Are there any classical Hollywood films where
a character
> commits the grievous sin of taking off their jacket or hat in
stifling heat?
> Lewis Milestone's (or is that Joan Crawford's) Rain is all I can
think of at
> the moment but that doesn't really count. Still, it may have been
an early
> indictment of fashion bullying given how both the weather and dress
are
> practically central characters. No wonder it was a flop. It's my
second fave Crawford.
>
I think the other Crawford -- Broderick -- takes his jacket off while
campaigning in All The King's Men. But Robert Rossen was a
Communist, so this may have been a subtle act of subversion.
Doesn't Sydney Greenstreet remove his jacket at some point in
Flamingo Road? And Greenstreet is the perfect example of a husky (to
employ the term that was used in my youth to make fat boys not feel
bad) man who was always impeccably dressed. And Paul Maxey, who was
probably the fattest man in the movies, always looked sharp as well.
Kevin, what's your favorite Joan picture?
10486
From:
Date: Tue Jun 1, 2004 6:14pm
Subject: Re: Re: fashion bullying/Milestone/Crawford
In a message dated 6/1/04 4:06:20 PM, damienbona@y... writes:
>
> Kevin, what's your favorite Joan picture?
>
Female on the Beach! I blab about it here:
http://neumu.net/continuity_error/2003/2003-00004_continuity.shtml
Kevin John
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
10487
From: Zach Campbell
Date: Tue Jun 1, 2004 10:49pm
Subject: Re: stylish clothing/fashion fascism/Arzner
Kevin John:
> Of course, comfort rarely seems to be an issue with fashion
> dictates.
But wasn't David's original point a cry against the displacement of
dapperness with slovenliness as fashionable? It is the slovenly-
chic that *is* a fashion dictate. As far as I can tell, it's not
comfort versus style that anyone was referring to before you brought
it up.
> Let's face it - the purpose of dressing stylishly is so that you
> can move through the capitalist machine more smoothly. A tucked in
> shirt arbitrarily, like all signs, connotes success, authority,
> professionalism.
Is it stylish dress or formal dress one uses to move through the
capitalist machine? Because there are surely communists with
impeccable wardrobes, and capitalist slouches--extreme examples that
our signs are never so cut and dried.
Also, it's not that "all signs" are completely arbitrary--the major
point of semiotics is to remind us that they *might as well* be
arbitrary. But usually signs are historically-based in human
reactions to the things they mean to signify, and often refer back
to the actual and justify their rootedness in them. In other words,
your generalization is entirely too cavalier. Take two stick
figures: one has an extra line for penis, another has two circles
for breasts. The point is that the differentiations between male
and female (or the gender categorization among people) might easily
be something else, and are not revealed to us by absolute connection
to 'the real.' But "abritrary" is not the right word at
all. "Arbitrary" denies the very real project to learn more about
ourselves by understanding precisely why our signs are NOT arbitrary
but have come into existence for particular reasons and with certain
purposes. Semiotics only takes us so far anyway.
My favorite Crawford movie is DAISY KENYON.
--Zach
10488
From: Noel Vera
Date: Tue Jun 1, 2004 10:54pm
Subject: Re: Jean-Luc Godard, imagined naked.
> > Isn't this pushing worship just a wee bit too
> far? Did the
> two of you actually kneel in front of that toilet?
> Come on guys,
> those stars are only human, after all (or am I
> rocking someone's
> dream boat?)
No dream was she; two years short of sixty and a
grandmother and she's still graceful and gorgeous as
she was in her movies.
> You didn't keep it?
I was afraid they'd chase me to the airport if I tried
smuggling it out.
I literally blew a chance to
> reconcile with my ex-
> because I didn't want to miss Sharmilla presenting
> Music Room at
> MOMA.
I've done that once or twice in my life...
10489
From: David Ehrenstein
Date: Tue Jun 1, 2004 11:32pm
Subject: Re: Re: stylish clothing/fashion fascism/Arzner
--- Zach Campbell wrote:
>
> But wasn't David's original point a cry against the
> displacement of
> dapperness with slovenliness as fashionable? It is
> the slovenly-
> chic that *is* a fashion dictate. As far as I can
> tell, it's not
> comfort versus style that anyone was referring to
> before you brought
> it up.
I wouldn't even go so far as dapperness. Though I
would happily go through life dressed like Belmondo in
"Stavisky."
>
> Is it stylish dress or formal dress one uses to move
> through the
> capitalist machine? Because there are surely
> communists with
> impeccable wardrobes, and capitalist
> slouches--extreme examples that
> our signs are never so cut and dried.
>
I wouldn't call marlene Dietrich in "Shanghai Express'
a"Capitalist machine." She says she's gone to Shanghai
"To buy a new hat." But she's dressed to go to Mars.
Travis Banton's creations for her are outside time,
instinctively extravagant, and always in exquisite
taste.
If that's the essence of capitalism then I'll happily
sign up for it.
> Also, it's not that "all signs" are completely
> arbitrary--the major
> point of semiotics is to remind us that they *might
> as well* be
> arbitrary. But usually signs are historically-based
> in human
> reactions to the things they mean to signify, and
> often refer back
> to the actual and justify their rootedness in them.
Oh whatever.
> In other words,
> your generalization is entirely too cavalier. Take
> two stick
> figures: one has an extra line for penis, another
> has two circles
> for breasts. The point is that the differentiations
> between male
> and female (or the gender categorization among
> people) might easily
> be something else, and are not revealed to us by
> absolute connection
> to 'the real.' But "abritrary" is not the right
> word at
> all. "Arbitrary" denies the very real project to
> learn more about
> ourselves by understanding precisely why our signs
> are NOT arbitrary
> but have come into existence for particular reasons
> and with certain
> purposes. Semiotics only takes us so far anyway.
And I'm not intersted in having sex with stick
figures.
>
> My favorite Crawford movie is DAISY KENYON.
>
Mine is Curtis Bernhardt's "Possessed" -- which begins
with a dazed Joan wandering aimlessly about Los
Angeles muttering my name.
__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Friends. Fun. Try the all-new Yahoo! Messenger.
http://messenger.yahoo.com/
10490
From: Craig Keller
Date: Tue Jun 1, 2004 11:46pm
Subject: Dietrich + 'Shanghai Express'
> I wouldn't call marlene Dietrich in "Shanghai Express'
> a"Capitalist machine." She says she's gone to Shanghai
> "To buy a new hat." But she's dressed to go to Mars.
> Travis Banton's creations for her are outside time,
> instinctively extravagant, and always in exquisite
> taste.
"She says she's gone to Shanghai 'To buy a new hat.' But she's dressed
to go to Mars." -- very funny (and accurate) indeed, David.
I wrote, less concisely, in an unpublished review --
"... A sensual and threatening interplay between light, shadow, and
layer upon layer of gauze circumfixes as ever the great director’s
gaze, the focal object of which is none other than the incomparable
Marlene Dietrich. Here she plays Shanghai Lily, a notorious Euro-vamp
whose past relations with fellow passenger Captain Harvey (Clive Brook)
inform the love affair at the center of the film. Based on the
reactions of the train’s global assemblage of men, it becomes apparent
that Lily’s reputation has already traversed the span between the
rail-line’s endpoints or wider, stranger zones, like a nocturnal
phantasy stalking a host in Murnau, Feuillade, or early Lang. But the
myth soon settles into flesh-and-blood reality as Lily’s traveling
companions realize she has no intention of playing spittoon for crass
ejaculation. Done up in raven-feather boa, a haze of tobacco smoke,
and an exotic veil that divides her face into a black and white
Domino-mask, Lily puts all preconceptions at bay once she commandeers
the negotiations to free Captain Harvey after he’s taken hostage by
guerrilla forces, even if the officer’s freedom comes at the cost of
giving herself over to an undersexed rebel leader (Warner Oland). ...
" blah blah blah
craig.
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
10491
From: jpcoursodon
Date: Wed Jun 2, 2004 0:07am
Subject: Noel and Bill, imagined naked.
--- In a_film_by@yahoogroups.com, Noel Vera wrote:
> > > Isn't this pushing worship just a wee bit too
> > far? Did the
> > two of you actually kneel in front of that toilet?
> > Come on guys,
> > those stars are only human, after all (or am I
> > rocking someone's
> > dream boat?)
>
> No dream was she; two years short of sixty and a
> grandmother and she's still graceful and gorgeous as
> she was in her movies.
>
>
> > You didn't keep it?
>
> I was afraid they'd chase me to the airport if I tried
> smuggling it out.
>
> I literally blew a chance to
> > reconcile with my ex-
> > because I didn't want to miss Sharmilla presenting
> > Music Room at
> > MOMA.
>
> I've done that once or twice in my life...
>
>
> I have always known that auteurists are, by definition,
fetishists. From worshipping "le nom de l'auteur" to worshipping a
toilet seat, there is, after all, a very thin line.
Bill, you didn't really want to reconcile, come on.
JPC
>
>
> __________________________________
> Do you Yahoo!?
> Friends. Fun. Try the all-new Yahoo! Messenger.
> http://messenger.yahoo.com/
10492
From: jpcoursodon
Date: Wed Jun 2, 2004 0:22am
Subject: Re: stylish clothing/fashion fascism/Arzner
--- In a_film_by@yahoogroups.com, David Ehrenstein
wrote:
>
> I wouldn't even go so far as dapperness. Though I
> would happily go through life dressed like Belmondo in
> "Stavisky."
>
> Oh David, why don't you, please???
> I wouldn't call marlene Dietrich in "Shanghai Express'
> a"Capitalist machine."
No one is a capitalist machine. It's something you have to go
through (according to the original writer, now forgotten -- but it
wasn't me)
She says she's gone to Shanghai
> "To buy a new hat."
One of the greatest lines in movie history, right?
But she's dressed to go to Mars.
> Travis Banton's creations for her are outside time,
> instinctively extravagant, and always in exquisite
> taste.
>
> If that's the essence of capitalism then I'll happily
> sign up for it.
You've signed. We've all signed.
>
>
>
>
> __________________________________
> Do you Yahoo!?
> Friends. Fun. Try the all-new Yahoo! Messenger.
> http://messenger.yahoo.com/
10493
From: Zach Campbell
Date: Wed Jun 2, 2004 0:22am
Subject: Re: stylish clothing/fashion fascism/Arzner
David E:
> Oh whatever.
I'm only trying to emphasize that signs have histories and contexts--
that the dismissal of "arbitrariness" is a pipe dream for an
ultimately complicit stance. (See Marvin Harris on the
counterculture.)
> And I'm not intersted in having sex with stick figures.
I'll be sure to add this information to my permanent files!
> Mine is Curtis Bernhardt's "Possessed"
*sigh* ... if only the YahooGroup poll function was activated, we
could see which one we like the best. Such as it is, POSSESSED goes
on my to-see list. (I thought I already had it there but didn't.)
--Zach
10494
From: Craig Keller
Date: Wed Jun 2, 2004 0:26am
Subject: On a Gainsbourg note...
Also curious to hear how members of this list rate Gainsbourg's various
albums. The only two I have are the 'Comic Strip' compilation (US) and
'Jane Birkin - Serge Gainsbourg.' (Of course I've always heard that
'Histoire de Melodie Nelson' is a masterpiece, but I wonder whether
that's only because it and the other Sixties albums were the ones
released during the peak of his Stateside/UK popularity, and when he
went off the beaten track critical expectations were already firmly
entrenched...?) In a small shop the other day, 'Aux armes et cetaera'
was playing -- it was the second disc with the dub versions of the
tracks -- did SG produce these, or did someone else mix them? Also
curious how the collective-you ranks Disc 1 in that set. Anyway, from
the two minutes in the store, I thought the dub-version of whatever
song was very strong -- maybe not the level of a 'Return of the Super
Ape,' but still pretty groovy.
If someone could simply explain what 'Charlotte For Ever' is about, I
would be much obliged; simply enough, have never seen it, nor knew
anything about it even existing until Godard mentioned it in the
interview on Paul G.'s site.
craig.
10495
From: Craig Keller
Date: Wed Jun 2, 2004 0:38am
Subject: On a Dreyer note...
This news just in from Nick Wrigley over the old Instant Messager (and
yes, as a seasoned chatter and a fast typer, I'll third or fourth the
notion that a balls-to-the-wall a_film_by chat free-for-all would be
very interesting, much better conversation than the odd afternoon hello
from Sally Stink or Jimmy Jit) --
craig.
==============
Turner Classic Movies will be screening a series of 10 or so Dreyer
films on Sunday evenings in September in the U.S. He's the subject of
the American channel's "Spotlight of the Month," a major focus of their
programming.
Sunday, September 5
TCM Spotlight Carl Theodor Dreyer
10:00 PM Carl Th. Dreyer: My Metier (’95)
12:00 AM The Passion of Joan of Arc (’28) (also Silent Sunday Night)
2:00 AM Vampyr (’31)
3:30 AM Carl Th. Dreyer: My Metier (’95)
Sunday, September 12
TCM Spotlight - Carl Theodor Dreyer
10:00 PM Day of Wrath (’43)
12:00 AM Parson’s Widow (’20) (also Silent Sunday Night)
1:30 AM Michael (’24)
Sunday, September 19
CM Spotlight Carl Theodor Dreyer
10:00 PM Ordet (’55)
12:15 AM Leaves from Satan’s Book (’19) (also Silent Sunday Night;
special start time)
Sunday, September 26
TCM Spotlight - Carl Theodor Dreyer
10:00 PM Gertrud (’65)
12:00 AM Master of the House (’25) (also Silent Sunday Night)
2:15 AM Carl Th. Dreyer: My Metier (’95)
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
10496
From: jpcoursodon
Date: Wed Jun 2, 2004 1:21am
Subject: Re: On a Gainsbourg note...
--- In a_film_by@yahoogroups.com, Craig Keller
wrote:
>
> If someone could simply explain what 'Charlotte For Ever' is about,
I
> would be much obliged; simply enough, have never seen it, nor knew
> anything about it even existing until Godard mentioned it in the
> interview on Paul G.'s site.
>
> craig
The film is about the "impossibly incestuous" (I think I'm quoting
SG)'s relationship between an artist/filmmaker (played by SG) and his
teenage daughter (played by Charlotte, Gainsbourg's own daughter).
The mother died in a car accident and the girl feels the father is
responsible. That's your "conflict". But it is really very intense
and just about one of the most "personal" films ever made. I didn't
see it when it was released but about five or six years ago in Paris
in a series dedicated to SG (in a tiny movie theater Rue Mouffetard --
the kind that always change their program before you have a chance
to get there, which is how I missed "Smoking/Non Smoking). If you
read French check out that Positif issue mentioned earlier.
JPC
10497
From: Dan Sallitt
Date: Wed Jun 2, 2004 1:30am
Subject: Re: Fwd: Re: Preston Sturges - Sullivan's Travels - opinions sought
>> -- as such I guess it answers the question
>>of "did Sullivan experience poverty?" with a resounding "maybe".
>>
> "Slumming" is the correct word. He is playing at being poor for
> research purposes, but you can't really know what it is to be poor
> when at any time you can go safely back to the lap of luxury.
Seems to me the film tackles this subject head-on with the early, very
striking scene with the butler played by Robert Greig. In a commanding
closeup and with great authority, the butler goes to great lengths to
establish poverty as the unknowable: "It is to be shunned, even for
purposes of study." Much like the pre-anaesthesia surgery mentioned in
the stern introductory title cards of THE GREAT MOMENT, poverty is
posited as a subject beyond the scope of cinema, evoked to contextualize
the function of the movie. - Dan
10498
From:
Date: Tue Jun 1, 2004 10:00pm
Subject: Re: On a Dreyer note...
Holy moley!
I'll finally get to see Michael, The Parson's Wodw, and Master of the House!
Totally speechless in Detroit,
Mike Grost
10499
From: Michelle Carey
Date: Wed Jun 2, 2004 2:00am
Subject: Re: On a Gainsbourg note...(un peu off-topic)
I rate most of his career very highly, he music was always very tied
in to what was hip at the time: the existential smokiness of the
late '50s, the yeh-yeh twist of the early '60s, the baroque
orchestral pop of the late '60s, the dusty rock of the early 70s and
then into reggae and badly-produced pop of the 80s. I wonder what
genre he would be working within if he were alive now.
I think he peaked with Je suis venu te dire que je m'en vais and
L'Homme a tete de chou, the latter consisting of an album-long
narrative about the character (monsieur cabbagehead) and the murder
of the hairdresser Marilou.
It is true that Serge and the NV travelled in parrallel lines, albeit
giving each other the odd sideward glance and smile. Craig, do also
check out the albums Serge produced for ACTRESSES Catherine Deneuve,
Isabelle Adjani, Jane Birkin of course and petit Charlotte. Also the
work of Jean-Claude Vannier, his Melody Nelson comrade, not
forgetting Alain Chamfort, Jacques Dutronc, Vanessa Paradis, Zizi
Jeanmaire, Francoise Hardy, BB, Bambou, Bijou, Anna Karina etc. Not
to mention all of those soundtracks. The best place to start is the 3-
CD box set of his cinema work. Or if you are interested, email me off
list and I can arrange to make you some burns (moi, une
gainsbourgienne).
Now, back to the cinema....
Michelle
--- In a_film_by@yahoogroups.com, Craig Keller
wrote:
>
> Also curious to hear how members of this list rate Gainsbourg's
various
> albums. The only two I have are the 'Comic Strip' compilation (US)
and
> 'Jane Birkin - Serge Gainsbourg.' (Of course I've always heard
that
> 'Histoire de Melodie Nelson' is a masterpiece, but I wonder whether
> that's only because it and the other Sixties albums were the ones
> released during the peak of his Stateside/UK popularity, and when
he
> went off the beaten track critical expectations were already firmly
> entrenched...?)
10500
From: Dan Sallitt
Date: Wed Jun 2, 2004 2:05am
Subject: Re: Re: Bill/Paul praised! Rockism in film? Seth welcomed!
> Sorry, but I can't say I can so much as STAND
> Cristgau.
Me neither. Solipsism and self-righteousness - a bad combo.
My favorite Christgau memory comes from the year when Michael Jackson's
THRILLER made its second, much more prominent appearance in the Voice's
Pazz and Jop poll. In his commentary, Christgau criticized the voters
who had elevated THRILLER to #1 after slighting it the year before, and
then also upbraided the ones who were too rigid not to modify their
earlier vote now that the album's importance had been demonstrated. Of
course, Christgau himself had taken a middle course, lifting THRILLER to
#9 or something. What a guy. (My memory of this piece is probably
distorting after all these years - does anyone have the original?)
> As bad as film criticism often gets ( eg. Richard
> Roeper, Elvis Mitchell, Michael Medved) it rarely
> reaches the depths of the music press.
Another "me too."
> Meltzer for all intents and purposes invented rock
> criticism with his "The Aesthetics of Rock" (Something
> Else? Press, 1970) which was at heart nothing more
> than a thesis paper for his philosophy class at
> Stoneybrook. For a brief moment he had a shot at
> becoming the American Derrida. But that moment passed,
> and with it much of what made Richard tolerable as a
> person.
He can be a bit cruel for my tastes, and I don't share his world view,
but I think there's something admirable about the solidity of Meltzer's
self-presentation. What looks like a persona at first glance is really
pretty rigorously honest and direct. - Dan
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