kingrat
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Posts posted by kingrat
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Thanks for the time correction, movieman!
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Tuesday, Dec. 1 at 8:00 EST (11:00 PST) TCM will show SCOTT OF THE ANTARCTIC with music by the great English composer Ralph Vaughan Williams. Vaughan Williams took some of the music he'd composed for the film and formed it into his seventh symphony, the Sinfonia Antarctica. Those who love great film music will want to be sure and catch this film.
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Kyle, Mr. 6, I think you guys will like THE LEFT HAND OF GOD. Bogey masquerading as a priest in China. Gene Tierney, Agnes Moorehead, E.G. Marshall, directed by Edward Dmytryk.
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They're very different. BLACK ORPHEUS sticks closer to the Greek myth, despite the Carnaval in Rio setting. Cocteau's ORPHEUS is more like a jazz riff on the legend. Cocteau personifies Death as a beautiful woman (Maria Casares) who loves Orpheus, and he adds a surprising amount of comedy to the mix, as when Orpheus becomes obsessed with the surrealist poems broadcast over the car radio in the Rolls Royce belonging to Death. Cocteau finds remarkable images that are pure film poetry. The journey to the underworld is particularly stunning. Both films have outstanding music. BLACK ORPHEUS has that haunting love theme, but Georges Auric's score for ORPHEUS is marvelous.
Cocteau's ORPHEUS seemed like an art film when it was first released, but with fantasy films now ruling the marketplace, ORPHEUS should seem solidly mainstream, and I'd recommend it to anyone who doesn't mind subtitles. If you know a little high school French, you'll catch some of the dialogue.
A MATTER OF LIFE AND DEATH has some beautiful images as well, especially the doctor's tower room with the camera obscura and some of the shots of the heavenly tribunal. The story of A MATTER OF LIFE AND DEATH appeals to me less than ORPHEUS, but I'm generally not fond of angel films or afterlife films. Both films are very well acted.
I think most of the posters on these boards would find much to admire and enjoy in all three films.
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About the only Czech New Wave film I've seen is Ivan Passer's INTIMATE LIGHTING, a charming comedy. A very funny scene involves a boy wanting a piece of fried chicken at a family dinner. The amateur musicians butchering one of the Brandenburg Concertos are pretty funny, too.
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Thanks for the recommendations. MissG, I also like RACHEL AND THE STRANGER, but did you ever think that it's really THE BISHOP'S WIFE GOES WEST? RACHEL was made a year after THE BISHOP'S WIFE. In each, a glamorous man's attentions to Loretta Young wakens Loretta's husband to the fact that she's wonderful and he doesn't want to lose her. (Of course, the non-glamorous husbands are David Niven and William Holden--not too shabby!) I do like that RACHEL AND THE STRANGER reminds us that some of the first settlers to America were indentured servants.
Among other frontier films, I'm really fond of both THE BIG SKY and SHANE.
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BG, glad you're also a big fan of KING RAT. So is Mr. Arkadin. If this film were widely known, it would acquire a following.
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1966 is a convenient end date. Old Hollywood--the studio system, the production code with its limitations on sex, violence, and subject matter--is almost over. In 1967 films like BONNIE AND CLYDE and THE GRADUATE showed brought the counterculture into the movie marketplace, and films like Easy Rider shocked the studios because no one could imagine a film like this making so much money. Anti-establishment attitudes became the new establishment. Old-fashioned films like CAMELOT, GUESS WHO'S COMING TO DINNER, OLIVER! and STAR! would continue to be made, but not for long.
Good films would be made, and some of them can be considered classics, but a particular way of making films ended around 1966.
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Jason Alexander??? I wouldn't have thought of him for anything!
Marie Dressler was in DINNER AT EIGHT with Jean Harlow
Jean Harlow was in RED DUST with Clark Gable
Clark Gable was in ADVENTURE with Greer Garson
Greer Garson was in SUNRISE AT CAMPOBELLO with Ralph Bellamy
Ralph Bellamy was in PRETTY WOMAN with Jason Alexander (Fortunately, neither played the title role!)
Next: John Gilbert to Desi Arnaz
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Hurray for the TCM programmer who gave us ORPHEUS and A MATTER OF LIFE AND DEATH as a double feature. Both films deal with characters caught in "the Zone," as ORPHEUS calls it, between this world and the world after death. Both films are beautifully photographed. Would love to write at more length about ORPHEUS, but first things first: thanks for bringing us ORPHEUS and for finding the perfect film to complement it.
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Does anyone else think Fran's actions suggest that she was not sexually fulfilled in her marriage? At the beginning of the film she couldn't express this idea even to herself, but as she allows herself to be unfaithful and continues, mustn't this be part of what she wants?
Laffite, thanks for starting a great ramble. DODSWORTH seems to justify all the attention we can spend on its details.
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Welcome back, Orson! Glad Miami is doing so well with films--not the same in many other cities.
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I do wonder about the casting of KINGS ROW. Someone at the studio evidently said, "We have to cast someone who goes to Vienna to study psychiatry. I know . . . Robert Cummings!"
Cummings is good-looking and pleasant, but very lightweight. Miscast in KINGS ROW.
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It was strange to see the young Lana Turner steal the film from James Stewart, Judy Garland, and an host of excellent character actors. Stewart also had some scenes where he was as angry and violent as in his Anthony Mann westerns of the mid-50s. All this plus great singing from Judy Garland and Tony Martin, not to mention showgirl costumes that had to be seen to be believed. If you haven't seen ZIEGFELD GIRL, check it out.
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Jackie Cooper's Ma in ZIEGFELD GIRL: "I didn't raise my boy to be a Ziegfeld Girl!"
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Isn't "greatest movies of this decade" an oxymoron? Grump, grump, grump. Perhaps Brokeback Mountain qualifies. Perhaps Milk. There must be a few others. The Dreamlife of Angels was late 90s.
I'm apparently the only person in the galaxy who hated Batman Begins--long, slow, and pretentious, Dirty Harry pretending to be Dostoevsky. Michael Clayton is agonizing for those familiar with the process of civil litigation. If you can accept Michael Clayton as a fantasy with no relation to actual law firms or legal systems, perhaps it's not too bad.
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Did anyone else see BACK FROM ETERNITY (1956)? I thought this was quite enjoyable, with a cast including Robert Ryan, Anita Ekberg, Rod Steiger, Beulah Bondi, Gene Barry, and Phyllis Kirk, as well as Jesse White, one of those actors you immediately recognize but have no idea what his name is. Well directed by John Farrow. Ryan pilots a plane which goes down in the South American jungle. Rod Steiger is well-cast as a German-born South American revolutionary, although you may be amused by his vocal approach: a Marlon Brando imitation. Anita Ekberg, who hadn't yet taken her bath in the Trevi fountain in LA DOLCE VITA, plays the "good bad girl" role.
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MissG, you put your finger on the real problem: Topaz doesn't have much emotional appeal. Whatever intellectual defense one might make of the film--and Mr. Arkadin, I really appreciate your insights into the use of color--there's little to move the emotions. Hitchcock need not make a suspense film, but he needs to substitute some other kind of interest.
For me, Hitchcock as a major director, and he's one of my favorites, ends with The Birds. The later films have their moments, but not enough.
I have to agree about Frederick Stafford. Compounding the problem is that he and John Forsythe are more or less the same physical type.
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You might even say that Malone does a killer mambo. Finance, I just watched House of Bamboo with Robert Stack in the lead role, alas. Believe me, he's much better in Written on the Wind. There are good reasons he didn't play many lead roles.
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I'm disappointed that the schedule of events hasn't been posted yet if passes go on sale in only five days. $500 is a substantial amount of money for those of us who have "champagne tastes on a beer budget," and I'd like to know what films will be on view.
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None of the four films chosen as Essentials this month--Take the Money and Run, Saboteur, Tom Jones, and The Devil and Daniel Webster--strikes me as essential. Not that they're bad films, but dozens of films are better, historically more important, or both. Tom Jones has some historical importance as being sexier than the average Hollywood product of the time. I could think of 12-15 Hitchcock films that could be Essentials, but Saboteur would never cross my mind. What do the rest of you think?
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Holly, those of you who get Fox Movie Channel might sometime be able to catch THREE COINS IN THE FOUNTAIN, which was a big hit in its day. Although Clifton Webb, Dorothy McGuire, Rossano Brazzi, Jean Peters, and Louis Jourdan also star in the film, Maggie McNamara probably makes the strongest impression. It's a very likeable film.
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I think joefilmone makes a good point about the leads being undercast in Topaz. To me, all the Hitchcock films after Psycho are undercast in one or more leading roles, except for Torn Curtain. One of the clearest examples is Family Plot: imagine that film with Jack Lemmon and Shirley MacLaine instead of Bruce Dern and Barbara Harris. Not all kinds of films demand stars, but Hitchcock's do. Saboteur with Cary Grant and Ingrid Bergman would be much improved. Notorious with Robert Cummings and Priscilla Lane--let's not even think about it.
Topaz does have some good actors in supporting roles. Roscoe Lee Browne and Karin Dor stand out for me. Like Fred, I'm a big fan of Day of the Jackal.
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Congratulations to lzcutter for her win and her outstanding schedule! Thanks to everyone who voted, and a special thank you to everyone who voted for me. CineMaven, many thanks for an intriguing topic and for all your hard work in organizing the challenge and the voting.
For all of you who haven't tried the challenge yet, please consider entering next time. Here are some of the things I learned from this competition:
1. It will probably take more time than you expect. But that's all right because:
2. You'll learn a lot about the movies from making out your schedule. Browsing through the databases, you'll see all kinds of titles that will make you go, "Hm, I'd love to see that." The TCM database, Google, Wikipedia, and imdb have a wealth of information about films, including something you've never paid much attention to before--the running time of the film. Just writing down the year of the film makes you realize the sequence in which the original audience encountered a star or a director or a kind of story. Imdb has a birthday feature that can suggests additional tributes for the week you've chosen.
3. Once you begin putting together parts of your schedule, you'll see new connections between films.
4. You'll be able to share some of your enthusiasms and also list some of the films you'd like for TCM to show. It never hurts to ask!
5. You'll feel a closer connection with others who are learning more about classic films.
What 10 films define America?
in General Discussions
Posted
1. APOLLO 13 - The American technological ideal at its best or most, well, Apollonian. The ultimate film about how American men work in groups. I can't think of an equally good or representative film about men and women working together.
2. A FACE IN THE CROWD - How politics and the media work in America.
3. THE BAD NEWS BEARS or HOOSIERS or some other similar film - The fact that this sports story is made over and over again shows how important it is to Americans. If you don't include a sports movie, you're missing something vital about America. Underdog stories are also part of our mythology. (I don't care for this kind of film, but that's a minority view.)
4. THE MALTESE FALCON - The cynical but honest private detective is one of our favorite images of ourselves.
5. SINGIN' IN THE RAIN - Isn't this film an American view of heaven?
6. SHANE - Everything about this film is mythic, and in a specifically American way. American boyhood and innocence, American silent hero, fragile American community in a spectacular landscape.
7. GONE WITH THE WIND - Scarlett O'Hara is probably the most famous character in American cinema. A great film about the limited options for women in earlier society, a film that shows how earlier generations believed in and rebelled against the importance of being ladies and gentlemen. America is about energy, and Scarlett O'Hara has plenty of that.
8. SINCE YOU WENT AWAY - Claudette Colbert, Jennifer Jones, and Shirley Temple show us a great deal about what American women are and are supposed to be.
9. HIS GIRL FRIDAY or ADAM'S RIB - The intelligent woman makes her way in the workplace and finds her ideal match.
10. THE SEARCHERS - An American hero in an American landscape who finally rises above his prejudices.