Last Movie You Saw, Name & Review Movie • Page 29

I haven't been as completely taken by a movie as I am by The Black Stallion in quite awhile. I absolutely love it. Could legitimately crack my top 100 (which, doesn't seem like much, but that's the top 3% of movies I've seen). One of the most beautifully shot movies I've ever seen. I've always liked Caleb Deschannel, and this might be his best work. The music is adapted gorgeously. I have an immense soft spot for kids/family movies that don't play dumb or play down to kids and this is one of the best examples I've ever seen

 

The Burmese Harp is tremendous. One of the most thoughtful films about the after-effects of war and how it affects a nation's view of itself and identity.

 

Fires on the Plain is also worth your time, if you haven't already seen that one.

 

That and An Actor's Revenge are on my list to see. I loved this and adored Tokyo Olympiad.

 

Unsurprisingly, Ishtar is neither the worst movie ever, nor a forgotten masterpiece. It's as okay as the other Elaine May film I've seen, The Heartbreak Kid. It's a little sour and interested in taking knives to the idea of the American male, and it has some good comedic moments and some that fall flat. Beatty and Hoffman do really well playing against type and playing dumb. And Paul Williams' songs are, unsurprisingly, perfect. Just embarrassing enough.

 

Woman in the Dunes is an incredible film. Maybe the single best allegory I've ever seen on screen. The way it's shot would make any horror director jealous, but the horror is more abstract, almost Kafka-level. Basically make an amazing horror movie where the redneck captors are just society making you a prisoner to give up what you love and work for them.

Herzog's Nosferatu: Phantom of the Night (my first Herzog) is, like all Dracula stories really, a bit boring. But definitely the best of the 4/5 versions of the story I've seen. It's beautiful, from the cinematography to the music to the makeup to the costumes. Klaus Kinski isn't as horrifying as Max Schreck in the original, but he's not far off.

Contempt is the closest I've actually come to outright liking a Godard film. Unlike everything else I've seen from him, it all actually hangs on a plot that he doesn't forget about mid-movie and the philosophical/art-house half-hour conversations actually center on what's happening in the plot of the film. Not to mention the man knew how to shoot a movie and the CinemaScope shots of all the beautiful coastline are amazing to look at, as is Brigitte Bardot, one of the most legendarily beautiful women in the world.

The Shop on Main Street is one of the best movies I've seen in any language. Using a Holocaust story to connect to the fascist regime the filmmakers were living under is a powerful move, and Ida Kaminska's performance is just heart-rending by the end of the movie. Fantastic freakin' film.

 

Can anyone give me recs if I'm someone who really, really enjoyed Her and Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind; I know I need to see the sunset trilogy, but anything else?

 

Punch Drunk Love, Being John Malkovich, To the Wonder, Lost in Translation

The Double was also a little charming

still haven't seen Adaptation or Chungking Express

 

Moon
Truman Show
Stranger Than Fiction

 

Suicide Squad. It's honestly not the disaster that so many have painted it as. It's nowhere near a perfect movie, but it's enjoyable as a popcorn super hero movie, Im no DC fanboy either.

 

Green Room
Fat Girl


just.... fuck.

 

Fat Girl is such a great bait-and-switch. Breillat in general is a master, but it is her best work and no one deals with female sexuality better.

 

Fat Girl is absolutely one of my least favorite movies I have ever seen.

Cafe Society makes me wish Allen had found Vittorio Storaro a decade ago

 

Dune is one of the worst films ever made. When you try to complete a director's filmography you are bound to get the bad ones, but it is hard to imagine this being the same guy.

 

my heart was already broken before the climax but jesus christ... watching her interviews now, it's wonderful how much thought and how much of herself she put into the two girls. i appreciate how thoroughly their relationship was developed - i guess that was rather the point beyond the sexuality, but it was excellent.

how come re fat girl?

 

Think Jodorowsky could have done a better job?

 

It would be hard to do worse.

It starts as badly as any film I have ever seen, with that weird five minute speech to fill us in on all the science fiction terminology. It is an interesting aspect of Lynch's career, coming right after Eraserhead and The Elephant Man and right before Blue Velvet. Lynch obviously does not care about the genre, and it only makes it more unfortunate that he turned down Return of the Jedi.

 

It mostly just feels like button pushing for the sake of button pushing. I don't think it has anything in particular to say about budding sexuality and was just like "how jarring can we make a prosthetic hard-on". Plus it has the most nonsense ending I've ever seen.

 

hm. i disagree pretty firmly but i won't go on about it if you're not looking to discuss it.

 

I mean, you're not going to change my mind because my response was viscerally and immediately negative. But I'm always down to hear the opposing side. Why do you love it?

 

trigger warning for anyone else roaming these lands, discussion of sexual assault.

the ending was definitely shocking but i think the whole film was leading up to it (i read that there's a lot of dialogue foreshadowing, curious to check that out sometime) - it's a meditation on female sexuality and how it historically is defined and commanded by men. the scene where fernando has anal sex with elena and all we hear is his moaning and her pained screaming - considering her age, how he pressures and manipulates her, it's clearly rape. but, she was determined to lose her virginity to someone she loved, so this was the way she thought was best to do that. even their sex the next night, although initiated by her, still falls squarely under statutory rape and unethical exploitation that clearly troubles Anais but fulfills, in some capacity, Elena's desire to be desired.

this is similar to and contrasted by Anais' rape at the end of the movie, and how she refuses to admit she was raped. beyond understandable shock, this is because she wanted to lose her virginity to someone who didn't love her; and more than that, she was desperate to be sexually valued by anyone, after constantly being compared to and demeaned by her sister for her looks. as much as she disgusts herself, she can believe that she was wanted by her rapist.

in both these cases, young women explore their sexuality, but are really just exploited by men. in both cases, they hide their activities due to shame and/or fear. both lose their virginity in the way they wanted, but it is painful, nonconsensual, and ultimately not what they expected or truly wanted.

there's also something to be said for the way the film explores sisterhood - Breillat talks about how they are simultaneously combative with and dependent on each other, and i think their moments of love for each other were among the most genuine and caring i've seen. it's a nuanced relationship where they openly disgust each other, and yet adore each other.

i also think there's something about vices that can be sussed out of the film; the dad's a workaholic, the mom chainsmokes, Elena is promiscuous, and Anais eats, but only Anais is regularly criticized and mocked for this - but i think that's secondary to the sisters' relationship.

 

That last point is actually one that really intrigues me that I feel like I was circling when I watched it and couldn't put my finger on.

 

yeah, i'm not sure how much we're supposed to pay attention to it, but it certainly seems intentional, especially given the mom's smoking habits getting a ton of screentime.

 

Since you guys seem to know a lot about film. I've always wondered what cinematography is exactly?

 

Yeah I definitely felt like, given the title, it didn't really seem so concerned with her fatness. Which seemed odd to me, like she was pulling at the thread without doing anything with it. But that actually changes the way I look at that aspect a bit.