Last Movie You Watched

[Brian]

Ghajini, the Bollywood remake of Memento, is remarkable (though that does not necessarily mean the same thing as "good"). Because it's Bollywood, the first two hours is a romantic comedy about the couple getting together, then suddenly she gets murdered, he wakes up with all the tattoos and Polaroids, intermission happens, and then the second two hours are the Memento remake. 

[Cato]

[Quote from: Papy Oli

Thank you for your takes on Fellini and Lynch 

Also noted about "Amarcord" @JBS , thank you!

on April 20, 2023, 06:11:13 AM]

Over the last 2-3 days, Four movies I tried for the first time

I didn't go beyond 45 min to 1 hour for any of them

Fellini's 8 & 1/2
Fellini's Dolce Vita

Both tiring and disjointed, overdubbing not helping either

I've seen one Fellini film, Amarcord. I suggest trying that one when you're in the mood.  It's apparently bawdier than usual, and based on Fellini's own teenage years.

Let me recommend one of his earliest and most famous movies:  La Strada (The Road) with Anthony Quinn at his Anthony-Quinniest    and, rather unexpectedly, Richard Basehart, as a circus clown.

The movie is not a comedy. 

[Papy Oli]

Let me recommend one of his earliest and most famous movies:  La Strada (The Road) with Anthony Quinn at his Anthony-Quinniest    and, rather unexpectedly, Richard Basehart, as a circus clown.

The movie is not a comedy. 

ok, noted as well, thank you @Cato

[Karl Henning]

As a kind of cool-down from Time After Time last night, I watched "Bergman 101" from the supplements to The Seventh Seal.

[vandermolen]

Tonight on DVD. This was a hoot!

[San Antone]

The 15:17 to Paris is a 2018 American biographical drama film produced and directed by Clint Eastwood and written by Dorothy Blyskal, based on the 2016 autobiography The 15:17 to Paris: The True Story of a Terrorist, a Train, and Three American Heroes by Jeffrey E. Stern, Spencer Stone, Anthony Sadler, and Alek Skarlatos.



The film stars Stone, Sadler, and Skarlatos as themselves and follows the trio through life leading up to and including their stopping of the 2015 Thalys train attack. Judy Greer and Jenna Fischer also star.

Better than I anticipated, actually quite moving. With each movie of his I watch I am more and more impressed by Clint Eastwood.

[SimonNZ]

A perfectly okay John Hughes -knockoff teen flick.

But I'd seen and heard it hyped in some serious places by some serious people as perhaps the best and cleverest Shakespeare "retellings" (Taming Of The Shrew), and I'm not seeing that at all. Even among the limited number of similar things I've seen I can recommend much better - the Macbeth with James MacAvoy and Keeley Hawes set in a London restaurant, for example. But its an okay teen flick.

[Cato]

We watched this again to show it to a friend of ours:



Franz Jaegerstaetter, the Austrian martyr depicted in the movie, is on the path to sainthood (canonization) in the Catholic Church.

Just a marvelous movie on every level: it uses works by Kilar, Schnittke, Gorecki, Paert, and others in the soundtrack to great effect!

[Karl Henning]

Only my second Bergman movie: Wild Strawberries. 

[LKB]

... I have lined up some other unseen major movies for the coming weeks (Lawrence of Arabia, Schindler's list, 12 Angry Men... and two I have only seen dubbed in French yonks ago but never in original English: Papillon, The Graduate) . We'll see how these goes.

Lawrence of Arabia features Sir Adrian Boult conducting Maurice Jarre's score, and is ( imho ) David Lean's masterpiece. You'll be happy to have it in your brain.

Schindler's List may be one of the films you'll never wish to see again, but it's probably the most significant film Steven Spielberg will ever make.

12 Angry Men, I've not seen.

[DavidW]

We watched this again to show it to a friend of ours:



Franz Jaegerstaetter, the Austrian martyr depicted in the movie, is on the path to sainthood (canonization) in the Catholic Church.

Just a marvelous movie on every level: it uses works by Kilar, Schnittke, Gorecki, Paert, and others in the soundtrack to great effect!

I'm not a Malick fan, but with that kind of music I might watch the movie!

[Cato]

I'm not a Malick fan, but with that kind of music I might watch the movie!

Yes, the scene using Kilar's Agnus Dei is very moving!

Mrs. Cato thinks this movie is marvelous, and finds it hard to believe that the same director was behind The Tree of Life , which in her opinion was three quick strikes and a looong slooow walk to the dugout! 

I liked it, but will agree that it takes tolerance at the beginning to understand that this is not a sequel to Jurassic Park!

Anyway, A Hidden Life is straightforward: Nature is used as a contrast to the unnatural events taking place in Human Nature.

[Cato]

The 15:17 to Paris is a 2018 American biographical drama film produced and directed by Clint Eastwood and written by Dorothy Blyskal, based on the 2016 autobiography The 15:17 to Paris: The True Story of a Terrorist, a Train, and Three American Heroes by Jeffrey E. Stern, Spencer Stone, Anthony Sadler, and Alek Skarlatos.



The film stars Stone, Sadler, and Skarlatos as themselves and follows the trio through life leading up to and including their stopping of the 2015 Thalys train attack. Judy Greer and Jenna Fischer also star.

Better than I anticipated, actually quite moving. With each movie of his I watch I am more and more impressed by Clint Eastwood.[/color]

Clint Eastwood has developed a fairly subtle, almost documentary style, where the camera does not draw attention to its presence.

I forget who the actor or actress was, but in an interview one of his stars says that he begins to film scenes by telling those in the scene rather quietly: "Whenever you're ready." 

[SimonNZ]

Second viewing.

Had ignored this when it came out expecting a standard sentimental costume drama. But was stunned when I did see if for its recreation of time and place and especially for the restraint and the subtlety in the storytelling and the acting.

Which is exactly what I think again this time. I'm almost tempted to read the novel its based on, but looking into some reviews it seems the film leaves out its flaws and leans into the parts that made it interesting.

[Cato]

Which is exactly what I think again this time. I'm almost tempted to read the novel its based on, but looking into some reviews it seems the film leaves out its flaws and leans into the parts that made it interesting.

Your comment made me think of Alfred Hitchcock's comment that great movies can be made from mediocre books, and that it is difficult to make a great movie from a great book.

With a mediocre book, you can excise the failures and improve upon whatever good parts are left.

With a great book, you will still need to make cuts....and since it is a great book, you will be cutting out things which range from good to perfect.

[SimonNZ]

I forget who the actor or actress was, but in an interview one of his stars says that he begins to film scenes by telling those in the scene rather quietly: "Whenever you're ready." 

I saw Tom Hanks say that on Colbert or something similar. And at some uncertain point he'd say just as quietly "okay, thats enough".


edit:

this isnt the one I saw, but he says it again here on Kimmel, and goes into more detail about why Eastwood works that way:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=96dvyy2PQMY

(The title "Tom Hanks Says Clint Eastwood Treats Actors Like Horses" is meant in a good way.)

[SimonNZ]

Second viewing, first since its original release.

Found a copy of the BFI essay on it and want to give it a fresh viewing before seeing how the author untangles its mysteries.

[relm1]

Just saw "The Whale".  Ugh...probably the saddest movie I've ever seen.  It was really good if you are ok being in a dark, dark place. 

[Karl Henning]

Another At Long Last item: Carol Reed's The Agony and the Ecstasy. And, to go from the sublime to the ridiculous, revisiting at last a Woody Allen flick I've long shunned as too inconsiderable, but I want to try it afresh: Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Sex, But Were Afraid to Ask.

[Karl Henning]

Another At Long Last item: Carol Reed's The Agony and the Ecstasy. And, to go from the sublime to the ridiculous, revisiting at last a Woody Allen flick I've long shunned as too inconsiderable, but I want to try it afresh: Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Sex, But Were Afraid to Ask.

Everything you always wanted... was more amusing than a combination of [I remember] and [I gave it credit for, earlier.]