So, What Movie Did You Just Watch? (V.16)

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Not bad.

 

Agreed. Epic story of Genghis Khan, before he became infamous for his rule and savagery. Reminded me of Braveheart in style and violence. The movie showed how he grew up, his background so to speak, and it was a a historical lesson to boot!

 

I need to check out Epstein and early Walsh. I'm not a fan of later Walsh at all. High Sierra and White Heat - ugh.

After I watched Celine and Julie Go Boating last week, I ordered every Region 2 Rivette DVD there is. I'm very excited about exploring him further. Have you seen Rohmer's Six Moral Tales yet? They're great but his Comedies and Proverbs are even greater- unfortunately no Region 1 dvds of them.

As for Sir Manchester's question of favorite directors, I tried to come up with a top 10 but found it fruitless. Why? Because I forgot all about Hitchcock in my intitial top 20 I compiled. If Hitchcock doesn't mean as much to me right now, it only has to do with my current interests and frame of mind, and the fact that I'm not flush with the excitement of discovering his work. Hitchcock is obviously one of the ten greatest directors of all time.

So with that caveat, the five directors I'm currently most obsessed with are:

Luis Bunuel - Already discussed him
John Ford - Thought I knew all there was about him. Then the Fox at Ford set came out and I discovered his three Will Rogers comedies (the descriptions of them always sounded terrible) and Pilgrimage were as great as anything he's done.
Mikio Naruse - I've only seen six of his films, but that's enough for me to love him more than Ozu or Mizoguchi (Mizoguchi, whose films I've largely discovered this year through England's Masters of Cinema collection this year, has largely been a disapointment)
Rainer Werner Fassbinder - Me and the rest of the world are still trying to come to terms with the 40 feature films he directed by the time he died at age 36.
Claude Chabrol - I bought the two Region 2 boxsets that cover his late 60s/70s work this year (I had previously only seen his first two features and some of his 80s/90s work), and he is the only true heir to Hitchcock.

 

Squeezed this in waiting for my delayed plane out of Seattle this morning. (BTW, they have Seattle MLS gear for sale in the Adidas store downtown.)

 

Just saw Hancock, very good movie with a twist. Worth a watch.

 

Well, not very much early, early Walsh is available, but Regeneration is a lovely film. I haven't seen his later silents yet, but his early 30s pictures that I've seen are utterly tremendous - The Big Trail, The Bowery, etc. are fabulous. Few directors from the period were as ahead of their time in montage, mise-en-scene, and in their use of sound. He out-Eisensteins Eisenstein in one particularly amazing moment in The Bowery.

I personally like a lot of his later stuff and I don't quite see the aversion. C'est la vie though. His masterpiece to my mind is 1941's The Strawberry Blonde (my goodness this is a beautiful film, and my favorite American picture from that landmark year).

I might get Netflix at some point in the next few months, at which point I'll try and catch up with the Rohmers. Until then though, they're a no go. And Rivette - oy, I'm still kicking myself for missing every single film in the Rivette retro in Chicago a year ago. But...life, man.

SirManchester, I echo these comments. My list is only a reflection of what I'm interested in at this very moment in time. It changes often.

Oh, one more thing GringoTex, do check out Epstein as well as you can. The French disc of Coeur Fidele is astounding (although there are no English subs, so brush up on your French reading comprehension) and is most certainly worth picking up. The R1 disc of La Chute de la Maison Usher is also tremendous.

 

Beautiful

 

I'm interested to see what peoples thoughts are on this film. I saw it a few years ago, after being put off with all the bad reviews. But i have to say i'm glad i took the time to watch it. It was spectacular, i loved it.

I'm probably going to try to watch it again sometime soon, to see if i still feel this way now that i'm a few years older. But i doubt anything will change. GREAT film

 

romantic movie i like the most.

 

This was one of the few times where I actually enjoyed the American remake better than the original.

 

The Fifth Element (1997). Absolute crap. Not even the excellent Gary Oldman can save this clumsy flick.

 

I have a different opinion. I really like this movie. It's a really cool sci-fi movie. One of the great aspects of this movie is that they minimize the use of CGI. The aliens are all costumes which I feel is incredibly better that any CG crap. The story is told really well and there are a lot of funny parts. You didn't laugh at Ruby Rhod?

 

I'm with you. It's campy and insignificant, but it's also fun. All the characters are so completely over the top it's hilarious.

It's no 2001, but it's no Godzilla either.

 

Tongue in cheek space opera was clearly what Besson had in mind for this movie. (Well that and banging Milla Jovovich). So you can't really fault it for being "over the top" or not serious, since that was kind of the point of the exercise.

To me, this was Besson's last decent movie, it's all downhill after that.

 

Rhuby Rod was funny the first time around. Also, I really liked the opera sequence with the Diva. Although I never took it seriously -it's clearly intended as a spoof of Sci-Fi movies,-, I was at least expecting to be amused and entertained. Except for a few bits of Gary Oldman and the odd scene, I wasn't.

I just can't believe the same guy had shot Leon a few years earlier.

 

It's obvious that it's not meant to be taken seriously. This is one of those movies I get stuck watching if I'm channel surfing. Hell, the ballroom battle alone is worth it.

And really, how could any movie with Zeus as the president be taken seriously?

 

"Moooltipass!"

It's also one of the few movies where Jovovich's "performance" really works. Maybe that's because she has very little dialogue and she is mainly asked to prance around fay-like and look into the camera with wide-eyed wonder.

 

The Dark Knight

Joins Salaam Bombay and the third Lord of the Rings movie as flicks where I remember really checking my Timex. Alot. Although I rarely go to the flicks these days.

Frankly kind of tiresome.

And batman's voice when he has his hat on is stupid.

Went with the teen. Should have talked her into Wall*E.

 

Yes, the movie was a bit long (it would have been awesome had it ended 30 minutes earlier IMO = shades of Empire Strikes Back) and the talking when he had his mask on were distractions, but count me in with the 98 percentile crowd.

Dark Knight's Record Midnight Madness

"Per an exit poll conducted by MovieTickets.com, word of mouth on the Christopher Nolan film is, as expected, excellent. Ninety-eight percent of respondents, in fact, rated the film "excellent" or "very good," the ticketing service said."

 

I'd put it in the good to very good, although tending towards good. I just tend to be disappointed with the seeming sacrosanct limitations of this enterprise.

 

I just saw The Dark Knight. Awesome movie.

 

i frickin' loved the Dark Knight. it was the first time i've gone to see a movie at a midnight showing, and i certainly was not disappointed.

 

Warming up for this weekend - I'm going to try and catch an early showing of The Dark Knight, if it's not sold out.