kingrat
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Posts posted by kingrat
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Thanks for filling us in on the background of Dede Allen and the editing of BONNIE AND CLYDE. I agree 100% with your comments about 1967 and the clash between the old and the new. That's why I consider 1966 the last year of the classic Hollywood era, though pictures in the old style did continue to be made.
The editing nominations for DOCTOR DOOLITTLE, IN THE HEAT OF THE NIGHT, and GUESS WHO'S COMING TO DINNER look embarrassing in hindsight. So THE GRADUATE and IN COLD BLOOD were also shut out of the editing category.
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I've been a big fan of James Woods ever since I saw him in THE ONION FIELD. A very fine film, and Woods is a wonderfully rotten villain. If you want to see him when he was even younger, check out NIGHT MOVES, where he plays the no-good boyfriend of a very young Melanie Griffith.
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We're on the same page about THE SHINING. Nicholson starts out playing the guy as if he's nuts already, and there's nowhere to build.
A bit off the topic, but since we're discussing Kubrick: the most hilarious bit of graduate student pompous nonsense I ever heard was one guy's comment that "BARRY LYNDON had to be boring, because Kubrick was trying to show that the eighteenth century was boring." Who knows, maybe he was.
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Yes, Holly, BONNIE AND CLYDE, one of the films that comes first to mind when we think about remarkable film editing, did not even win a nomination. One assumes that the old boys' club simply shut out Ms. Allen. BONNIE AND CLYDE had many nominations, but not for the one category where they had the most obvious winner.
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To join together some recent threads of this discussion: Though I like LOLITA quite a bit, some of Peter Sellers' scenes are excruciating. This may not count as an unpopular opinion, since Alec Baldwin and Robert Osborne said the same thing in their discussion of LOLITA.
Hey, Jonny, you may like SPARTACUS. This is the film Kubrick disowned. It has some human warmth in it; maybe that's why. If you like Jean Simmons, you'll probably like her scenes at the very least.
I'm just the opposite of scrutney: I love Garbo, but don't care for the non-Garbo parts of NINOTCHKA. Casting Melvyn Douglas, an actor with zero sex appeal, as a romantic lead is not the swiftest of moves.
Ultimate heresies: CHARIOTS OF FIRE is a better film than REDS. I'm happy that FORREST GUMP won the Oscar. I really liked A BEAUTIFUL MIND. FOUL PLAY is funnier than almost all of the widely admired screwball comedies of the 30s and 40s. Both THE GODFATHER and THE GODFATHER, PART II, though they have good elements, are greatly overrated.
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THE FURIES has some devoted fans on these boards, and I'm one of them. Stanwyck, Walter Huston, and Gilbert Roland perhaps should have received Oscar nominations, and Judith Anderson should have won Best Supporting Actress.
It isn't just actors who get robbed of Oscars. How about Dede Allen not winning the Best Editing award for BONNIE AND CLYDE--not even nominated--when films like GUESS WHO'S COMING TO DINNER got Best Editing nominations?
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OK, I'll play. Marlon Brando is not very good in THE GODFATHER.
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Hibi, I've seen A FAREWELL TO ARMS with Hayes and Cooper, directed by Frank Borzage. If you like the stars, you'll probably like the film. Hayes is also not bad in ARROWSMITH as Ronald Colman's wife, directed by John Ford.
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Jean Simmons in ANGEL FACE and Deborah Kerr and Donna Reed in FROM HERE TO ETERNITY.
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Films about shock treatment: THE SNAKE PIT and AUTUMN LEAVES
Films about lobotomies: SUDDENLY LAST SUMMER and FRANCES
You could pair EASY RIDER, the beginning of the countercultural era, with AN OFFICER AND A GENTLEMAN, which shows the triumph of the Reagan revolution (it's safe to say that Hopper, Fonda and Nicholson had no desire to be officers or gentlemen). Or show the straight line connection between THE GREEN BERETS and AN OFFICER AND A GENTLEMAN.
THE 400 BLOWS and THE MOTHER AND THE ****: Jean-Pierre Leaud as a boy, the hope of the French New Wave, and then as the dissolute slacker at the end of the New Wave and New Left eras.
THE BIG SKY and BROKEBACK MOUNTAIN: the implicit and explicit versions of the gay cowboy theme.
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The choice between Olivia in THE SNAKE PIT and Jane Wyman in JOHNNY BELINDA is something like the choice between Daniel Day Lewis in MY LEFT FOOT and Morgan Freeman in DRIVING MISS DAISY. One role is very showy, with lots of dramatic scenes; the other role is mostly interior, with lots of reacting and indicating thoughts and feelings silently. A tough choice for me.
Those 1970s all-star disaster movies tended to waste stars who were a little past their prime, but THE COBWEB wastes several stars who are right at the top of their game. They were lucky this film didn't mean "curtains" to their careers.
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Jonny, you're absolutely right about Burton and MY COUSIN RACHEL. I'd guess that the powers that be thought a young actor would have a much better chance of winning in the supporting category, even though it's ridiculous to put Burton there. Even now, the youngest actor ever to win Best Actor is Adrien Brody at, what, 29? Anyway, it's one of Burton's best roles.
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Other films that dealt with mental illness: AUTUMN LEAVES and THE COBWEB.
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Thanks for the vote, Frank! Let's hear it for Joan Bennett premieres.
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As for what Rossano sees in Kate, she's as exotic for him as he is for her. He understands much about women and recognizes her repressed passionate nature.
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Filmlover, thanks so much for the covers. The Jennifer Jones cover is perfect for my schedule. Love the Laurel and Hardy!
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I included this in my entry for the current programming challenge, since "Food, Glorious Food" was the special topic. You know Barbara is really in love with guy when she cooks eggs for his breakfast. I think anyone who likes Barbara Stanwyck would find LADIES OF LEISURE worth watching.
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Skimpole, I like both of those performances, but as for Mariel Hemingway in MANHATTAN--if you looked up "whiny" and "adenoidal" in the dictionary, you'd find her picture. She's supposed to be charming and attractive. Guess Woody's taste and mine don't agree.
Then there's Annette Bening in AMERICAN BEAUTY. The performance is well executed, unlike Mariel's agonizing moments on screen, but the director apparently wants her to play the role as cartoonishly as possible. Again, to my taste, unwatchable.
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Actor: James Fox (King Rat), George Segal (King Rat), Ralph Fiennes (Quiz Show), Humphrey Bogart (In a Lonely Place), Humphrey Bogart (either The Maltese Falcon or High Sierra, same year)
Actress: Diane Cilento (Hombre), Mary Astor (The Maltese Falcon), Lee Remick (Anatomy of a Murder, Wild River), Jean Simmons (All the Way Home, Elmer Gantry, Spartacus), Pat Quinn (Alice's Restaurant), Jennifer Jones (Beat the Devil), Jean Peters (Pickup on South Street), Gloria Grahame (In a Lonely Place), Jane Greer (Out of the Past)
Supporting Actor: Harry Andrews (The Hill), Ossie Davis (The Hill)
Supporting Actress: Judith Anderson (The Furies), Mary Astor (Act of Violence), Aline MacMahon (The Man from Laramie), Jo Van Fleet (Wild River, Cool Hand Luke)
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Fred, I'm afraid I don't share your enthusiasm for GOODFELLAS. I think it's a pretty good film, a solid three stars out of four, but nothing particularly excites me. I get a little tired of Joe Pesci by the end of the film.
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Here's a shout out for John Lithgow and Glenn Close in THE WORLD ACCORDING TO GARP. They were brilliant in that year's best film.
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More difference of opinion. I'm fond of FORREST GUMP and even fonder of Tom Hanks' performance. I like CHARIOTS OF FIRE much better than either REDS or ON GOLDEN POND, though I wouldn't have minded if it had lost to ATLANTIC CITY or RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK. On the other hand, take BRAVEHEART...please! Rather ridiculous, IMO.
George Burns won an Oscar for THE SUNSHINE BOYS not so much for acting as for still being able to breathe.
A number of so-so screenplays have won Oscars because they were really well directed. DEAD POETS SOCIETY is a good example, but also MOONSTRUCK and THELMA AND LOUISE.
Jonny, I always enjoy your posts, even when I don't agree. It's much more important to say what we really like than what we think we're supposed to like. You're absolutely right that certain films have acquired a nostalgic glow by losing the Oscar they were expected to win. If REDS had won, people would probably call it a bloated Beatty vanity project and put it on their list of ten worst Oscar choices.
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lzcutter, thanks for doing a great job hosting the challenge. Would you please send me a private message so that I can respond with a private vote? That's the only way it seems to work for me.
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Thanks, TCM Programmr, for letting us know! I'm sure all of us contestants appreciate the kind words.
The films of Merchant-Ivory
in Films and Filmmakers
Posted
Great post, Jarrod. I'd never thought about how the success of Merchant Ivory films encouraged others. HEAT AND DUST is another very enjoyable Merchant Ivory film. My favorite is probably THE REMAINS OF THE DAY, although HOWARDS END is also splendid.