@“2501”#p104208 lesbians sure are talking about Tár.
I was not prepared for *Clouds of Sils Maria*.
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@“Tradegood”#p104014 There’s also some kind of unnecessary b-plot stuff in it, but I think it makes it even more fun.
If you mean any of the stuff involving Jo-Ann I think it adds to the frustration we feel through Val and of course it transfixes Maria who still thinks of herself as Sigrid, right?
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@“2501”#p104207 Look the bottom line is, in isolation, meta-discourse aside
yes this is what I've been trying to get to lol. And again, I'm not trying to give the film a pass based on good intentions, was contrasting that perspective with the assumptions made about the creators and the making of the film
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@“2501”#p104208 Personal Shopper
good movie yeah
@"captain"#p104165 https://archive.org/details/blueiswarmestcol0000maro
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@“connrrr”#p104222 If you mean any of the stuff involving Jo-Ann I think it adds to the frustration we feel through Val and of course it transfixes Maria who still thinks of herself as Sigrid, right?
Specifically I meant the scenes where Jo-Ann acts in the sci fi stuff for laughs and Val and Maria have light hearted conversations about the state of acting and artistic integrity. I love the scenes, and they are clearly a deep wink toward Kristen Stewart, but it's not particularly deep commentary and doesn't really payoff. For a film is all about standpoint, and I don't remember Maria accepting Val's standpoint about there being value in low art. But you're right it does contribute to the frustration.
Meanwhile Jo-Ann's more important trait -- that she's a wild child who fights with Paparazzi -- gets subverted in a **very** satisfying way when >!we sympathize with her despite her breaking up a marriage and leading to his partner's suicide attempt. The press sets up this expectation that she's a bad person, but when we learn about her life and relationships we understand she is trying to navigate with a sense of empathy and maturity. She is in the wrong, but what's also wrong is a society to push young women into a corner and create unfair expectations for them (in the same way that Maria was both victim to and did to Jo-Ann & Val).!<
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@“yeso”#p104224 2501 Personal Shopper
good movie yeah
very good movie yeah
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@“2501”#p104208 NOT seconding Portrait which I was lukewarm on to begin with but now feel obligated to campaign against after the Sight & Sound debacle
Honestly, I can't blame you because this is how I feel about Jeanne Dielmann at the moment. That list made me turn on it like a lazy susan. Sure, it's 'important' and everyone should see it, but the same can be said of going to the dentist. Films have the capacity to be so dynamic and lyrical, and coronating a meditation on solitude as The Best Film is crazy to me. It strikes me as filmgoers only caring about having "the right opinions" to post on their Letterboxd. I know I'm being unfair to Ackerman and I enjoyed the movie more than I expected, but it doesn't encompass the potential of film like movies we typically put as #1.
Citizen Kane, Vertigo, The Rules of the Game, etc are usually at the top of these types of list, even though we all agree none of them are really objectively the best films ever, they are stand-ins for the thrills, the chills, and potential that movies can provide. What does Jeanne Dielmann say about the medium? To strive to naturalism over imagination? That one idea executed well is better than ambitious imperfections? That we're resigned to powerlessness in a state of capitalism that drains us of our humanity?
just watched blade runner 2049 and had low expectations after it being something of a commercial flop and wow I really liked it a lot. wish is seen it in a theater cuz Hulu streaming didn‘t really have the fidelity it deserves. it’s fascinating how sometimes this kind of sorta surreal-psychedelic-ish slow burn can have huge names and budgets and a wild spectacle of effects and sounds and cinematography. such a modern dissociation throughout it, tonally. I don‘t watch many movies these days and am super out of the loop so there were a few times where I thought, holy shit, I didn’t know big-time movies were doing this, haha
that said the representation of women in it was...not great. thematically appropriate for both the movie and like, Our Modern Times, but still, not great
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@“Tradegood”#p104322 coronating a meditation on solitude as The Best Film is crazy to m
this isn't what happened, although it's what was reported. What happened was more critics selected it on their top 10 list than any other film.
Why do people hold the reception of a film against it? I truly don't understand this thinking at all. I continue to discover I'm just not a "cinephile" I guess
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@“yeso”#p104577 this isn’t what happened, although it’s what was reported. What happened was more critics selected it on their top 10 list than any other film.
Well, art doesn't exist in a vacuum, and our feelings toward art are impacted by the world around us. The whole reason for a list like sight and sound is that every few years it's updated to tell us something about modern tastes. It's also literally labeled The Greatest Films of All Time as a numbered list, so it invites us to view it the results way even if the methodology doesn't quite line up with that. They're asking a very open ended question, but having a population of 1600 voters does show that film need to cross a very high bar to be considered on this list. You can't quite account for margin of error with such an open ended question but realistically there are finite amount of potential films in consideration anyway. BFI doesn't share the margins as far as I know, but it seems to be reasonably stable year over year, and Dielmann being a very significant outlier that is worthy of some interrogation!
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@“yeso”#p104577 Why do people hold the reception of a film against it? I truly don’t understand this thinking at all. I continue to discover I’m just not a “cinephile” I guess
As I said before, I think it's a good film and I know it's not fair that I can't endorse it like I used to... but the film takes on a different meaning when you hold a different frame to it. This film in particular, so much of it is context-dependent for me. 10 years ago it was an undeniable underdog, Ackerman had gone unappreciated in her time, and the film's text literally focusing on Dielmann as someone who is overlooked -- created a mirroring between reality and the art that enhanced the film's impact on me. It's also a very hostile film to the viewer and challenges the viewer to meet it on its level. I fear that the film's hostility toward the viewer, which succeeded at creating sympathy when I saw it -- can now be interpreted as arrogance because of its newfound reputation as the top film. When these sorts of variables are changed, you're still left with a good film doing very interesting things very well, but it loses something essential to the viewing experience.
And I do resent being called a "cinephile" for this take... because I'm actively trying to reject the "cinephile"''s framing!
didnt mean to call you a cinephile, that was just an aside directed to myself which I ought to have omitted
But I'm afraid I have to disagree that critical reception should factor into your own opinion of a film (or book or whatever). I mean if it genuinely has the effect for you then who am I to judge, but consider: if say in 2032 _Jeanne Dielman_ falls off the list, would you appreciate the film differently? Critical appraisals, public perception, "the discourse" etc affects how we might be primed to receive a work of art, but I feel sort of strongly that should be resisted. We're all subject to that stuff, I described here a while back how reading reviews about Tar primed me for a certain kind of movie - but when I watched it I found it was a lot different than I expected.
here he comes
[upl-image-preview url=https://i.imgur.com/2GGVbFp.jpeg]
@“yeso”#p104615 I‘m not saying that critical reception should factor in, I’m saying that it does for me in a strong way due to the style and subject matter of the film. I first started attention to these type of list in 2007 when AFI came out with their 100 movies. I wanted to see all of them, having loved the ones I saw. But when I sat down to see #4, Raging Bull, I didn't get it. It seemed like a macho circlejerk about an unsympathetic slob. What made it worse was seeing so much praise for the supposed “beauty” of the fight scenes which I felt were too violent and dizzying. That assessment of it never sat right with me.
But you get a little older, you watch more Scorcese, more new hollywood movies, and you build a deeper understanding of what the traditions are and ways Scorcese breaks it or inherits it, and that made me soften on it. At the same time, Raging Bull also left the zeitgeist, it wasn't even on the Sight and Sound possibly for the same reasons that I didn't click with it, and as a result I think it is more worth revisiting and reevaluating now than if it stayed unquestioned at the top of the film canon.
@“connrrr”#p104006 Are you OK with suggestively lesbian? Jacques Tourneur’s Cat People (1942) is a “read between the lines” horror classic.
https://youtu.be/QSou8Bv5__M
@“◉◉maru”#p104689 if it's old enough that it had to be subtext then yes of course. I forgot all about this movie, so thank you!
As Tears Go By is interesting to return to because it feels like a movie by someone else, though you can see the seeds to his future career. I find it kind of charming that Wong Kar Wai made a gangster movie but still couldn't help trying to make a romance. The way the gangster narrative and the romance narrative run alongside one another and even intersect without ever really managing to come together is kind of funny.
Anyway, going through his whole career is going to be fun. I feel that many people have sort of turned on Wong Kar Wai in the last decade, but he's always been my favorite and will likely always be my favorite.
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@“yeso”#p103927 hey maybe The Outwaters will be the good one of those sorts of things
it was ok I guess. Appreciate the ambition on a $500 budget. There were some cool shots. But nothing too special imo. This movie, like Skinamarink feels like "content" rather than a film - idk if that matters a ton or anything but they both make a strong aesthetic or mood impression, but then don't really have anywhere to go from there, so they wind up feeling overlong and repetitive. Ofc that's also down to the budget and the format, since you're not likely to get a five act structure out of a found footage horror film. It most reminded me of a feature length Alantutorial youtube, but with a lot less subtlety. Also, not this particular movie's fault but cosmic horror is really getting run into the dang ground imo.
@“Tradegood”#p104663
As an adult I remain somewhat befuddled by Raging Bull. I loved it when I was 16 and similarly saw it then because of the 1997 (?) AFI list as well as Ebert writing about replacing Taxi Driver with Raging Bull on his Sight and Sound list. Then rewatched at 20 and I didn't finish it. Too much yelling! And every scene kinda felt like the same scene in a way where I was like "okay I get this is the point but why?"
I rewatched it a few years ago and I think it's fine (fat LaMotta in the second half pulls a lot of weight so to speak) but also nowhere near the top of my Scorsese list. Even Goodfellas (another movie I'm only so-so on) feels like something where if someone is like "that's my favorite Marty" I get it more than Raging Bull.
Though who am I to talk after Taxi Driver my faves are probably Cape Fear and Shutter Island (lol).
That Sea Beast movie on Netflix is pretty all right. Feels like How to Train your Dragon but with pirates instead of vikings. And that's pretty good!
@“Coffinwarehouses”#p105030 That‘s really interesting, I googled a bit for Ebert’s justification but couldn‘t find much. I would be curious to know why. I think our generation has more trouble relating to LaMotta then Ebert’s. I think the people who would take the time to sit down and watch Raging Bull these days are more thoughtful about things like domestic abuse and self-destruction then ‘da guys’ who were just going to see a boxing movie in 1980. We‘re also so overexposed to people behaving very badly in public compared to the way baby boomers viewed the greatest generation. It feels like it’s speaking to those audiences, meanwhile Taxi Driver and Mean Streets have a timeless and modern feel.
Shutter Island, haha! I don't judge, I personally like Scorcese's more lighthearted movies like After Hours and Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore over his crime movies. I think Taxi Driver, After Hours, Silence, and Kundun are probably my top 4, and I'll defend Age of Innocence -- which all just speaks to how prolific and diverse his works are outside of the narrow view of mob movies that he's associated with. Still need to see Cape Fear!
I saw The Watermelon Woman and loved it.
@"Tradegood"#p105065 After Hours is so good.
Tonight I conclude my survey of obscure tales of sand & strangeness with some real bangers, including yet another criminally underseen cinema classic from Albert Pyun…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aFl-TC2aTLE
And the token "just fun, just balls to the walls, goofy fucking fun" entry of the evening would have to be...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e6AeScDSe68
And the token "what in the hell am I watching, this is legitimately insane" entry of the evening would have to be...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u4WMa5SfqJg
Last but not least is the fourth movie of the evening that will make you go "why don't more people know about this movie?"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H35XGYQeIN4
Stream starts at the usual time, 8PM EST, and at the usual destination…
https://www.twitch.tv/wondervillenyc
watched Eo at long last. I thought it was real good. Felt like watching a picaresque, ambling childrens‘ picture book intercut with like Kooquuannatsi (don’t know how to spell that) music and images. Obviously the subject matter isn‘t really for kids, but it has these somewhat mysterious yet broad strokes and strange incidents like the somewhat out of time Polish circus girl or the sad, hot priest with gambling problems, or the unlicensed salami animal smuggler/metal guy who gets killed by I guess a truck stop serial killer, or the soccer team brawl (I liked the detail of the ref later appearing at the victory party for the team that won on a PK). Thought the film was wonderful to look at and felt very tactile: lots of mud, clothing fabric, wind, animal fur all shot in a way that suggested tangible sensation. Also: the really wild shots are used sparingly - I thought the claims about that aspect were a bit overstated. It’s a humble film imo, not even 90 minutes long and doesn't really bother with building toward any ending or “message”. Easy halloween costume = wear a carrot necklace around and you can be Eo