Last Movie You Watched

[Todd]

They were part of the change the '70s brought (Jaws, Star Wars, Superman), and they crowded out the film world of Penn, Grosbard, Pakula, Altman, Peckinpah, Coppola, Scorsese, Perry and others. Spielberg and De Palma could thrive in the new environment, for obvious reasons, the others often appeared to be lost.

The other directors listed may have lost their touch after the 70s, but Scorsese?  I should think not. 

Whenever I read about a Golden Age in any endeavor, it always strikes me as old person nostalgia.  Whipper snappers of today just can't so things as well as masters of days gone by, I tells ya!  There are some problems with that.  First, most of what was made in the Golden Age was crap, just as most of what is made today is crap.  Second, time filters out the bad stuff, hiding the crap.  Third, not all great films age well and lose resonance with newer viewers, and some films gain in stature when they really ought not to.  People who see supposedly unalloyed masterpieces when they are new may not see this last development.  I've watched a number of great films that are not quite so great.  For instance, The Godfather is great, no doubt.  The Godfather, Part II, also touted as great, is a much lesser film.  It's still entertaining, and has some strong performances, but it is just not as good.  And as much as some people like to say that great art is timeless, that isn't always the case.  Seeing films from the 60s and 70s, or earlier periods, particularly "realistic" films, shows how dated they are, and they may not be as meaningful to newer viewers.  They may not be dealing with timeless issues, either. 

There are brilliant filmmakers today, making films that are as compelling and as great as anything from the Golden Age, any Golden Age - Paul Thomas Anderson, Alfonso Cuaron, Darren Aronofsky, Nicolas Winding Refn, Wes Anderson (for some, I guess, I loathe what I have seen from him, but no denying his reputation), possibly Quentin Tarantino, other art house faves - and there will be more in the future. 

I should say that, at least for me, the same thing holds true for literature.  Yes, there are some great pieces of literature that are timeless, but a lot of old literature doesn't appeal to me because it's from times and places which hold no interest for me or don't resonate with me.  When I do read fiction, which is rare given my tastes, I tend to prefer more contemporary authors to those dead for decades or centuries.  I don't really care about the lives of 19th century aristocracy, for instance.

[Brian]

Yes, there are some great pieces of literature that are timeless, but a lot of old literature doesn't appeal to me because it's from times and places which hold no interest for me or don't resonate with me.

A great example is a book I read earlier this year: W. Somerset Maugham's The Explorer. Maugham is justly renowned for his descriptive prose, but the very same plot elements which made the book so successful 110 years ago (a heroic explorer overcomes his shyness to seduce a strong woman, but he's concealing a terrible secret about his honor) make it a rank pile of garbage today (a ruthless murderer of African tribesmen convinces an independent woman to submit, but then is ostracized for a logical decision he made).

[Wakefield]

A great example is a book I read earlier this year: W. Somerset Maugham's The Explorer. Maugham is justly renowned for his descriptive prose, but the very same plot elements which made the book so successful 110 years ago (a heroic explorer overcomes his shyness to seduce a strong woman, but he's concealing a terrible secret about his honor) make it a rank pile of garbage today (a ruthless murderer of African tribesmen convinces an independent woman to submit, but then is ostracized for a logical decision he made).

I'm maybe wrong, but it's the second time in a few days that I read a post of yours criticizing a writer from an ethical or political point of view, but not a literary one. I mean, for instance, women rights are one of the greatest, still unfinished, achievements of the last 150 years, but IMO this fact doesn't have any relevance from a literary point of view. Yesterday and today there was a lot of stupid men without any kind of awareness of these rights; but from a literary point of view, the theme itself has no importance because a lot of garbage can be a superb material for a gifted novelist, even if himself is full of prejudices, too. I think that, as Oscar Wilde said, there is no such thing as a moral or an immoral book. Books are well written, or badly written. That is all.

[snyprrr]

Re: CGI and rooms full of plugged-in nerds with godlike skillz and no sense of artistry whatsoever to counterbalance this vertigo:
This is my harsh opinion, too, and always the thing [CGI, action nonstop] that I reach for when I want to list reasons why I avoid ~all recent Hollywood fare.  But I keep wondering if I am dead wrong and not paying careful enough attention, or expecting the wrong kind of thing, e.g. yet more 70s Rembrandt lighting, a repetition to flatter my intact tastes. 

It's going to be interesting to me to see if some of the CGI looks great to me in ~30 years, assuming I am still alive and capable of vision.  I'm just thinking of good/bad uses of old 'new' capacities like zooms: there is Altman or maybe Leone using zooms (seldom or a lot, whichever), and then there are just hundreds of others zooming all over the place.  Zoom zoom zoom.  It might or might not be tacky, but it can be hilariously dated.  Same with handheld cameras, especially (??) as the low-light-capable tiny digicams come into use.  Why am I emotionally enthralled by some uses (Dardenne Bros.) and distracted and irritated by so many others?  Or moved by some uses of one filmmaker's handheld (Greengrass in UNITED 93) and annoyed elsewhere (all other Greengrass movies)?

Maybe the same will apply to CGI?  I am now trying to think of intensely CGI movies where the graphics were amazing and I simply couldn't digest them.  I watched SIN CITY for the second time not long ago and for a while found it incredibly exciting, until several things mucked it up for me.  That's a movie whose look was virtually all virtual AFAIK, and I was still really impressed.  Did it matter that a major comic artist/writer was an integral part of that project?  Of course, I heard Miller's own THE SPIRIT was crud, and I still haven't caught it.

I hear ya!

The Horror genre's use of CGI has just transformed the medium, ugh, just look at the difference between Carpenter's 'The Thing' and the new re-make (though, there is one or two decent SHOTS). What exactly do make-up artists DO these days, seeing as most stuff is computer generated. EVEN BLOOD IS CGI!!!! aaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhh

Zombies are the only thing requiring make-up?

'Scanners',... old Cronenberg in general... noe there's some cool effects!

[snyprrr]

Hm, I've not seen that one yet. I guess you are rec'ing it?

YOU haven't seen FC? I mean, I guess you haaave to see it. I'm just curious about Friedkin... and I missed the car chase, but, it has the grainiest 1970 camerawork, and I suppose... I guess you just have to see it.

Curious how there is someone falling down a flight of stairs in both FC and 'The Exorcist'. I was looking for more comparisons,... the flat, bland style masking the exciting drama...

[snyprrr]

    The one Perry film I'd start with is Man on a Swing, which has more than a little of the mysterious quality of The Parallax View, Night Moves and The Conversation.

I've been largely disappointed by the level of conspiracy in all those classic films: none of them seem to rise to the levels of The Manchurian Candidate', especially the Condon follow-up Winter Kills. Hollywood CAN'T expose the powers-that-be because,... well, isn't it obvious? Kubrick died before the release of his critique. Pekinpah wasn't really allowed to. Coppola totally whitewashed to true criminals of the mob (oy vey), so, I might just call that generation the cover-this-up-for-us generation of filmmakers. Geeeh, look at Oliver Stone.

The TV movie 'The Brotherhood of the Bell' is pretty a lot more overt than a lot of these 'masters''s works.


I mean, look who tell the Tom Cruise character in 'Eyes Wide Shut' what's going on: Sidney Pollack. I mean, isn't it obvious who's feeding us our myths?

[snyprrr]

Persona (1968)

edit:

not Persona, Hour of the Wolf (1968)

HAAATED IT!

Someone pleeease explain this one to me. Guh, I seem to loathe Swedish humor,... or just the people Bergman wishes to skewer, perhaps they just remind me of relatives? haha

So, an artist goes crazy... why? Meaning?

aaaaaaaahhhhhh

I equally have some trouble with Persona too. Maybe it Anderson's lips?

[snyprrr]

Yes, they have offered some TCM goodies via my cable company's on-demand service:

The French classic with Simone Signoret (who comes complete in tight dresses and a cancer stick hanging out of the side of her mouth) Diaboliques was offered.

Right now: Vincent Price in The House on Haunted Hill directed by "Schlockmeister" William Castle, who was responsible for two of the oddest movies ever made (not good, just odd): Zotz! with comedian Tom Poston, and Mr. Sardonicus with Oskar Homolka.

My wife met and spoke with Vincent Price 40 years ago or so. Summer theater used to a be a staple for actors who wanted to keep their stage skills sharp.  Dayton had an impresario named John Kenley who brought in TV and movie actors to star in musicals and comedies.  By chance my wife had a student, whose family was connected to the Kenley Players, and they invited her to come backstage after a performance and meet Vincent Price with a few other people.

Anyway, my wife said he was the nicest, humblest man: he just praised her over and over for "sacrificing to be a Catholic-school teacher" and how important her work was, and chatted about other things.  Genuinely modest to a fault, and most personable.

Some good '60s Italian fare yesterday with Christopher Lee. And yea, who doesn't like Price? 'Horror Express', with Lee, Cushing, and Savalas! was on. 'Black Sabbath'...

[Todd]

And a lot of the language used by the hot newer whipper snappers was developed by the really old stuff essentially. And the very best of those snappers realize that in BIG way and are avid students of that rich film ancestory they inherited .. no one learns in a vacuum.

True enough, but that doesn't diminish the distorting effect of nostalgia.  Old brains get stuck in ruts.

[George]

Good, dirty fun.

[snyprrr]

Ron Howard's 1989 hit, written by fellow family men Lowell Ganz and Babaloo Mandel (Splash, A League of Their Own), is an original comedy about contemporary life and the eternal responsibilities of raising children. Steve Martin has never been better than as a dedicated husband and father trying (and inevitably failing, as do most of us) to balance the demands of his kids and his job. The actor, like his character, throws himself into the part quite touchingly, particularly in a scene where a hired clown fails to show up at a children's party and Martin's character unabashedly provides the entertainment. Good as Martin is, this is actually an ensemble piece with numerous actors playing members of the same family, with cross-generational joys and disappointments in the air--and parents in conflict, children in love and so on. Jason Robards is very good as a patriarch who finally accepts the reality that the son he adores (Tom Hulce) is a major screw-up. --Tom Keogh

[asin]B006TTC4Y6[/asin]

ok, James, enough's enough.

Never in a million years would I have thought you would have outed yourself as a hopeless fogey. Parenthood?? Really??? You must've been watching too many Kevin Kline movies?!? WWSD?

WWSD?, James, WWSD?

Or WTFS?

[snyprrr]

No one likes Bergman?

[Todd]

Watched Terminator 0, er, Westworld, all the way through for the first time in probably thirty years.  Dated, but good fun.  I couldn't help but notice how much young James Brolin looks like Christian Bale.  He looks more like Bale than his own son.

[Artem]

I Married a Witch
Dir. René Clair

Nice little movie which I saw around halloween time.

[Octave]

They were part of the change the '70s brought (Jaws, Star Wars, Superman), and they crowded out the film world of Penn, Grosbard, Pakula, Altman, Peckinpah, Coppola, Scorsese, Perry and others. Spielberg and De Palma could thrive in the new environment, for obvious reasons, the others often appeared to be lost.

The other directors listed may have lost their touch after the 70s, but Scorsese?  I should think not. 

I think drogulus' point had to do with economics and control (directors vs. producers, artists vs. company-men), rather than with falls-off in creativity: "lost in the green-light shuffle" rather than simply creatively adrift.  And I got the idea that it was not so much "good old days" that he was talking about, but precedents for what's possible in a big swath of the medium (for stretches of time, at least), since then. 

It's still sometimes hard for me to know what these super famous guys are complaining about.  The problem was getting 'personal' projects off the ground and properly funded, and Scorsese repeatedly talks about the 80s being tough for him (I think he's really most concerned about the those lower on the food chain than himself, who hurt a lot worse); but he got five features made (if you count GOODFELLAS but not RAGING BULL), a legendary music video (I guess), and a short that might be one of my several favorite things by him (and Nick Nolte) ever (LIFE LESSONS): has he ever done anything more personal?  I've found him always interesting but much more hit/miss since the 80s than during.

I use older movies as a counterweight or ballast to the new water-cooler-conversation stuff, of which there is certainly plenty of interest; but the major disadvantage of having had less for the dross and diamonds to sort themselves out.  Hence GMG's film thread sometimes seeming a bit like a viral marketing scam with an inordinate amount of attention paid to schlockola Hollywood crap.
One great thing about the past remaining as competition for the present is that there's a huge amount of stuff that's perhaps essentially different, containing different sensibilities and different performances styles.  Productively irrelevant.  It's no more automatically matter of 'nostalgia' than watching lots of "foreign" (sic!) [non-American] movies is a matter of 'exoticism'. 

Maybe that is one reason I love hearing Martin Scorsese talk about old movies, American and otherwise....there's devotion and appreciation for things that might be harder, or impossible, to get away with now.  Hearing Tarantino talk about his choices in old/downtrodden/downmarket cinema is interesting for the same reason, though substitute wired enthusiasm (also not really a hipster characteristic) for Scorsese's devotional fervor.

[Octave]

     Here are some films by Frank Perry, centered on the '70s but extended a bit:
The Swimmer (1968) [...]

I was wrong, I had not missed it....if anyone else wants to see THE SWIMMER, it's on Turner Classic Movies (USA), Wednesday night, 6 Nov at 2am EST (actually Thurs morning).
This will be my first Perry movie, though both DAVID AND LISA and LADYBUG LADYBUG have been sitting in the queue forever, without me knowing anything about them.

[Octave]

THE MAGGIE [aka HIGH AND DRY] (Alexander Mackendrick, 1954)

I liked it very much.  A rather different tone for comedy, not usually the laugh-out-loud variety, but with the kind of strange, entomological blocking and detachment that I like so much in, say, Fellini.  (I don't see any close similarities, though.)  A very gentle commentary on mid-American-Century new-world-ascendent business/money mania ("what do you mean, I can't buy it?") and more gentle satire on the charm of passing traditional/local cultures (and their features which can look by the new standards like 'inefficiency' and mild, innocent corruption).  Also the repeated gag of Britons being made America's post-war middlemen/brokers; a Scottish joke?   Melancholy and amusement together throughout.  A wonderful and bittersweet interlude with a young woman approaching the aging American businessman (Paul Douglas) to dance, then talking to him about her hopes and fears for the future; it's just a few minutes, but it is magic and worth the 90 minutes for this alone.

Also greatly to the film's credit that it doesn't come off as a tract.  There really are no bad guys.  The American businessman is the terrific character actor Paul Douglas, a fusty galoot of a man.  Never better.  In fact, the film probably ends up with at least as much sympathy for him as for the ramshackle puffer-boat crew.

I guess I'd prefer several other Mackendrick movies that I've seen (SWEET SMELL OF SUCCESS and LADYKILLERS are great), but this one was charming and rather different from anything else by anyone.  Lovely but not flashy photography with some unusual, subtle framing choices.

Maybe only superficially (Scotland as a place apart) related is the gentle and fun 'cultural resistance' put forth by Bill Forsyth's LOCAL HERO, also a charming movie.  (Which gave Peter Capaldi to the world.  And where would we be without him?) 

[Todd]

I think drogulus' point had to do with economics and control (directors vs. producers, artists vs. company-men), rather than with falls-off in creativity

How many Hollywood insiders populate this forum, I wonder?  My guess is none.  Yet somehow, you or drogulus have some special insight into the movie making process, into who controls what gets made?  I don't buy it.  Filmmakers have groaned about those bad men who control studio budgets since the time of DW Griffith.  It's part of the public part of the business from what I can see, and pointing to the 60s and 70s as a Golden Age of "personal" films, of the apex of auteurs' influence, is just part of the distorting nostalgia I referred to before.

[George]

Having loved Baumbaugh's prior work (Squid and the Whale, Greenberg), I expected this to be damn good. It wasn't. 2/10 stars.

Greta Gerwig's biggest achievement here is playing the same character she played in Greenberg - only somehow portraying it in an even more annoying fashion. 

[Octave]

Yet somehow, you or drogulus have some special insight into the movie making process, into who controls what gets made?  I don't buy it.

There's really no need to talk like an asshole, Todd; especially if you're not going to bother to read the posts to which you pretend to retort.  If it's 'Hollywood insiders' you trust for information (people who subscribe to VARIETY instead of TRAFIC or FILM COMMENT), then servility of taste is the problem.  You routinely weigh in on the merits of this or that performance of music, e.g. Beethoven sonatas: what are your qualifications?  Usually you repeat the record collector's usual CV: I have heard all the available recordings of this repertoire, no one has spent more time getting to know the performances.  Fine enough, but this still doesn't settle anything, hence the tooth/nail combat routinely defining record collectors' debates about this or that performance.  Virtually utterly unresolvable, almost hopelessly unobjective.  Maybe Drogulus and I don't feel a similar need to submit to and exert this kind of authority.

I made a long post that attempted to qualify my own (and maybe by extension, New Erato's) distaste for CGI/action-nonstop movies by reflecting on how the ~CGI of the 60s has aged (improving or depreciating or simply looking different over time); no authority was claimed, just a reflection on values of style and how I receive them.  Drogulus' ~most-offending post I'm going to simply quote again below, to give you another chance to read it, apparently for the first time.  His comment about teenage-boy target audiences isn't something he's coming up with on his own, nor is it merely 'self-evident'.  I actually re-read his couple posts that you were ostensibly responding to, and I am hard-pressed to find anything approaching the caricature of nostalgia you present.
I'd actually make reference back to something James said, except I'd say it more generously: young whippersnappers working in the Hollywood movie houses or "independently" frequently express admiration for previous eras (in Hollywood, the 60s/70s are a prime example because a number of those guys are still alive and working) as an inspiring example of how much can be possible in the medium without completely losing one's shirt.  I think of Steven Soderbergh as being (up until just recently) a pretty inside-insider, and he's capped his career talking left and right about his frustration:

I certainly get the sensation that we've kind of hit a wall in the last 20 years. Obviously, people are pushing the technical side of it - and when Avatar (2009) comes out that'll be a game-changer for sure - but in terms of the grammar of cinema, I haven't seen anything made since the late '70s or early '80s that I felt was really pushing the ball forward. That doesn't mean I haven't seen some good movies, but I don't feel like there's been a new wave of of how stories are told cinematically. Some of the recent Godard stuff is pretty extraordinary, Notre musique (2004) was really, really beautiful and he got at something at the end of that movie that I wasn't sure you could get at in a movie. But what's the audience for that? How many people are interested in watching somebody make that attempt? I'm frustrated by what's going on in the business, in terms of what's getting made, and I'm frustrated by my own inability to break through to something else.

But hey, he's just one guy, right?  But this one example is notable, because he's one guy who sunk a lot of his own money, apparently, into a low-budget production (MAGIC MIKE, $7 million) that made him, apparently, fabulously rich (it made something like $167 million).  I disliked that movie (aside from one stylistically Altmanesque scene), but that doesn't matter; it sets a precedent, not unlike the "risk" by some independent investors in Aronofsky's BLACK SWAN not long ago, which apparently had a hard time getting off the ground.  (Aronofsky: "Now they are fucking rich.")  I hate the money angle, but it's a fact of all pictures, and the 60s/70s was a little local (H'wood) renaissance in that it provided the prospect of a viable bottom line as a reward for a slack rein on artists.

     Why were the '70s so great for American films? A number of reasons operate, foremost that the counterculture began to seep into Hollywood, so instead of making movies about it, "it" made the movies. Second, the first wave of post studio system producers and directors wanted to make more serious films (see the Kubrick documentary for his own observations on this point), and for a time they managed to do it, until Hollywood established the new paradigm of blockbusters aimed at immature males, which still prevails.