A perfect picture of a moment in time when the rosy-hued dreams of community and consciousness of the 60s and 70s came to rest, as it were, in the conversation of two men approaching middle-age. The screenplay is a marvel in itself.
The word "personal" should be silently inserted in the title by anyone genuinely interested in the "story of film". This might help readers (and viewers) to consider those films and directors who don't make it into the narrative.
For example, one outstanding figure of the French New Wave who also stood somewhat out of it by virtue of his more conservative values, namely, Eric Rohmer, doesn't appear at all. (Correct me if I'm wrong.)
This example is also a clue to where Cousins' political sympathies lie: with the rebel film-makers whose "messages" veer to the Left, and whose "images and ideas" (to quote Cousins' theme) omit their own totalitarian potential.
Poignant, moving, profound: we are all actors and audience in the theatre of life. Except that when we die, grow old, or are born, fall in love, experience that first heartbreak, or hide in the bathroom at a party, there's no going back - for real.
Our tastes for the cinema of pre-1989 East Germany may have been roughened by spy/action fare. This movie delivers almost the direct opposite of those expectations: subtle, detailed and slow-burning, it burns nonetheless. In its own way, it's a high-tension suspense thriller, with a rich moral sense of life and its actualities under continuous clumsy, bureaucratic surveillance and the threat of state violence.
Nabokov: "...A very good film, but it's not what I wrote."
If you'd like to find out what Nabokov did write, and why the last laugh is on us, read:
Appel, Alfred, Jr. (1991). The Annotated Lolita (revised ed.). New York: Vintage Books. ISBN 0-679-72729-9.
One of the best guides to the complexities of Lolita, especially Appel's Introduction and Nabokov's Afterword "On a Book Entitled Lolita".
Some choice Nabokov quotes:
"Lolita is a special favorite of mine. It was my most difficult book—the book that treated of a theme which was so distant, so remote, from my own emotional life that it gave me a special pleasure to use my combinational talent to make it real."
"I shall never regret Lolita. She was like the composition of a beautiful puzzle—its composition and its solution at the same time, since one is a mirror view of the other, depending on the way you look. Of course she completely eclipsed my other works—at least those I wrote in English: The Real Life of Sebastian Knight, Bend Sinister, my short stories, my book of recollections; but I cannot grudge her this. There is a queer, tender charm about that mythical nymphet."
"I would say that of all my books Lolita has left me with the most pleasurable afterglow—perhaps because it is the purest of all, the most abstract and carefully contrived. I am probably responsible for the odd fact that people don't seem to name their daughters Lolita any more. I have heard of young female poodles being given that name since 1956, but of no human beings."
Think of the wider more contemporary context: the decline of a politically-correct West, and the rise not of independent post-colonial democracies but of Islamic Jihad and Islamist ambitions for global empire. The new imperialists take the place of the old. The atrocities of recent years put these older battles in the shade. In 1966 the Sartres, Godards and Pontecorvo's did not see this coming. The result is a surprisingly innocent film as seen from nearly fifty years later.
Yep. Underrated. With several winks to It's a Wonderful Life (complete with angel) and to every other rise-fall-rise again movie plot. Especially The Lion King (1994) - "Circle of Life". The tough newsroom line is dripping with satire ... You gotta laugh.
D'ya think Allen's Isaac - and Allen himself - is unaware of the slightly "creepy" aspect of the relationship with Tracy?
Next to the superb Sven Nyquist-influenced black-and-white photography and lighting by Gordon Willis, especially impressive in BluRay HD, the script and screenwriting is worth every minute of repeated viewings over the years. It ages gracefully and naturally, as Tracy comments in one of her many outstanding moments of unaffected intimacy.
To those commenters who would prefer to remain grumpily unmoved, on the surface of the film, so to speak, I'd say: "Persevere with repeated spontaneous viewings of this affectionate, humane and wise film, pausing to view the frame and replay the conversation, for the reward is very great."
Morally, a film in a very doubtful place. Do we not get almost the same gratification as the gamblers? The thin subplot suggests that is exactly what is on offer.
Oh, and then view the Coen's remake with this theme in mind. See what then appears ... try it, it's very revealing whether or not you think either or both films are good or bad.
Here's the thing: it should be viewed from the point of view of the plot and structure, whereupon it transforms into a masterpiece of character acting - which leads to its understated central theme or idea, namely how character judgements are formed. To get a better idea of this theme, look at the way such character judgements about the central figure of the "little old lady" are formed and developed.
Ideally, therefore, if your are new to this film, you should see it twice before making up your own mind.
The "third act" is precisely where a pretty ordinary crime, with a broken leg in the way in more senses than one, turns and twists into a noir triple-crosser.
Seeing this for the second time, later (much later) in life, the character of Mrs. Robinson (Anne Bancroft) stands out, as the most moving and deeply realised character of them all. The comedy (=marriage) belongs to the next generation, while the tragedy (=death, loneliness, sterility) is almost entirely hers alone. Politically-incorrect, I know, especially if you're young; when you're older, and a "graduate" so to speak, not so much.
If you take care to listen to the script, and to note the artistic skill and significance in the composition of nearly every frame, there is a great deal more than a Simon & Garfunkel soundtrack in this top movie.
Here's the thing: the male character is the central protagonist, and the child of the title.
The main tussle is not only between a sociopath and his responsibility to others, and impact upon them; but also between value and price in a culture in which the idea of earning something by working for it (instead of by stealing) seems to be only for losers. "Only ****ers work."
Two themes stood out for me: first, the sinister Manson-Jonestown dimension to a set of decayed 60s mantras, like "There are other ways of living" and "Just exist". With a Deliverance or Winter's Bone element as well.
And the second is the ambiguous line between real, mind warping terror and paranoid schizophrenia.
A terrific film, although one I'd hesitate to make a favorite.
Here's the thing: the film itself is the real content of "Tiny Furniture". It sets off the lost, disoriented experiences by simply being there, and so the apparent aimless emptiness is neither aimless or empty because it is (in)visibly filled by the film. What comes through is a compasionate intelligence and self-reflective artistry, or better, a turning of lived experience into art. Consider how much would have gone into writing it, scrpting the family quarrels for instance. It's not so easy to capture the ordinariness of ordinary NY urban life, and even more difficult to turn it into something with a shape and meaning.The key scene which "explains" it, the "reveal", so to speak, of the filmmaker who is also the main player, comes in the last shot, in her mother's words before sleep. Completely well done, and deserves to be more widely seen.
Like many others, I too got hold of a used copy of the Guide, found FilmFanatic.org online, and now am delighted that "the list" made it onto iCheckmovies.com - which amongst other things is the best "list of lists" and cloud-memory for any film lover. Danny Peary's original reviews stand out from the ruck for freshness and honesty.
Completely original and should have won the Oscar.
I remember as a teenager being deeply moved by it when it first came out; now many years later it again struck me as fresh.
It wears its formality lightly: even though every word is sung, the dialogue is close to natural, if slower than normal. Deep, rich, saturated (Eastman)color complements the depth of emotion. In the background is grand opera: Bizet's Carmen's tragic Romeo-and-Juliet theme in counterpoint.
Yes, definitely underrated. It has elements of the "tale fantastic" but it is most effective not in terms of realism - or lack of it - but rather the psychology of sex. Both protagonists begin the story at opposite emotional poles, and move through carefully plotted scenes of humiliation, revenge, compassion, and effectively the equivalent of rape to restore "normal" conditions of mutual love.
Especially notable are the cross-references to Blue (Juliette Binoche blunders into the early courtroom scene) and Red (check the sheets of Julie Delpy's hotel room bed where the "lovers" re-unite). And there's a mysterious appearance of a figure next to Zamachowski as he buys a bottle of vodka ...
There's also some significance to the director's choice to put the title in Polish ("Is it because I cannot speak French? ...").
It's easy to judge harshly from where we are, but historically at least this movie marked a couple of important steps, including establishing Bogart as a leading man and spawning several remakes both as a gangster flick and a Western.
Comments 1 - 25 of 57
Movie comment on My Dinner with Andre
Neville
A perfect picture of a moment in time when the rosy-hued dreams of community and consciousness of the 60s and 70s came to rest, as it were, in the conversation of two men approaching middle-age. The screenplay is a marvel in itself.Movie comment on The Story of Film: An Odyssey
Neville
The word "personal" should be silently inserted in the title by anyone genuinely interested in the "story of film". This might help readers (and viewers) to consider those films and directors who don't make it into the narrative.For example, one outstanding figure of the French New Wave who also stood somewhat out of it by virtue of his more conservative values, namely, Eric Rohmer, doesn't appear at all. (Correct me if I'm wrong.)
This example is also a clue to where Cousins' political sympathies lie: with the rebel film-makers whose "messages" veer to the Left, and whose "images and ideas" (to quote Cousins' theme) omit their own totalitarian potential.
Movie comment on Holy Motors
Neville
Poignant, moving, profound: we are all actors and audience in the theatre of life. Except that when we die, grow old, or are born, fall in love, experience that first heartbreak, or hide in the bathroom at a party, there's no going back - for real.Movie comment on All the President's Men
Neville
For a recent update on the whole affair seehttp://www.commentarymagazine.com/2012/04/30/ben-bradlee-and-watergate/
Movie comment on Barbara
Neville
Our tastes for the cinema of pre-1989 East Germany may have been roughened by spy/action fare. This movie delivers almost the direct opposite of those expectations: subtle, detailed and slow-burning, it burns nonetheless. In its own way, it's a high-tension suspense thriller, with a rich moral sense of life and its actualities under continuous clumsy, bureaucratic surveillance and the threat of state violence.Movie comment on Lolita
Neville
Nabokov: "...A very good film, but it's not what I wrote."If you'd like to find out what Nabokov did write, and why the last laugh is on us, read:
Appel, Alfred, Jr. (1991). The Annotated Lolita (revised ed.). New York: Vintage Books. ISBN 0-679-72729-9.
One of the best guides to the complexities of Lolita, especially Appel's Introduction and Nabokov's Afterword "On a Book Entitled Lolita".
Some choice Nabokov quotes:
"Lolita is a special favorite of mine. It was my most difficult book—the book that treated of a theme which was so distant, so remote, from my own emotional life that it gave me a special pleasure to use my combinational talent to make it real."
"I shall never regret Lolita. She was like the composition of a beautiful puzzle—its composition and its solution at the same time, since one is a mirror view of the other, depending on the way you look. Of course she completely eclipsed my other works—at least those I wrote in English: The Real Life of Sebastian Knight, Bend Sinister, my short stories, my book of recollections; but I cannot grudge her this. There is a queer, tender charm about that mythical nymphet."
"I would say that of all my books Lolita has left me with the most pleasurable afterglow—perhaps because it is the purest of all, the most abstract and carefully contrived. I am probably responsible for the odd fact that people don't seem to name their daughters Lolita any more. I have heard of young female poodles being given that name since 1956, but of no human beings."
Movie comment on The Man Who Wasn't There
Neville
Nabokov. YES! The same moral intensity and dark humor.Did everyone get the critique / examination of post-modernity? Fabulous. My literary cinematic heroes, the Coens are.
Movie comment on 2 ou 3 choses que je sais d'elle
Neville
Godard = the whispering narcissist in your ear, and in the ear of his central character.Movie comment on La battaglia di Algeri
Neville
Think of the wider more contemporary context: the decline of a politically-correct West, and the rise not of independent post-colonial democracies but of Islamic Jihad and Islamist ambitions for global empire. The new imperialists take the place of the old. The atrocities of recent years put these older battles in the shade. In 1966 the Sartres, Godards and Pontecorvo's did not see this coming. The result is a surprisingly innocent film as seen from nearly fifty years later.Movie comment on Dazed and Confused
Neville
To judge how far above and away the movie is from the odd offhand comment or two, just try writing a script like it. Then filming it.Movie comment on The Hudsucker Proxy
Neville
Yep. Underrated. With several winks to It's a Wonderful Life (complete with angel) and to every other rise-fall-rise again movie plot. Especially The Lion King (1994) - "Circle of Life". The tough newsroom line is dripping with satire ... You gotta laugh.Movie comment on Manhattan
Neville
D'ya think Allen's Isaac - and Allen himself - is unaware of the slightly "creepy" aspect of the relationship with Tracy?Next to the superb Sven Nyquist-influenced black-and-white photography and lighting by Gordon Willis, especially impressive in BluRay HD, the script and screenwriting is worth every minute of repeated viewings over the years. It ages gracefully and naturally, as Tracy comments in one of her many outstanding moments of unaffected intimacy.
To those commenters who would prefer to remain grumpily unmoved, on the surface of the film, so to speak, I'd say: "Persevere with repeated spontaneous viewings of this affectionate, humane and wise film, pausing to view the frame and replay the conversation, for the reward is very great."
Movie comment on 13 Tzameti
Neville
Morally, a film in a very doubtful place. Do we not get almost the same gratification as the gamblers? The thin subplot suggests that is exactly what is on offer.Movie comment on The Ladykillers
Neville
Oh, and then view the Coen's remake with this theme in mind. See what then appears ... try it, it's very revealing whether or not you think either or both films are good or bad.Movie comment on The Ladykillers
Neville
Here's the thing: it should be viewed from the point of view of the plot and structure, whereupon it transforms into a masterpiece of character acting - which leads to its understated central theme or idea, namely how character judgements are formed. To get a better idea of this theme, look at the way such character judgements about the central figure of the "little old lady" are formed and developed.Ideally, therefore, if your are new to this film, you should see it twice before making up your own mind.
Movie comment on Double Indemnity
Neville
The "third act" is precisely where a pretty ordinary crime, with a broken leg in the way in more senses than one, turns and twists into a noir triple-crosser.Respect for Billy Wilder ...
Movie comment on The Graduate
Neville
Seeing this for the second time, later (much later) in life, the character of Mrs. Robinson (Anne Bancroft) stands out, as the most moving and deeply realised character of them all. The comedy (=marriage) belongs to the next generation, while the tragedy (=death, loneliness, sterility) is almost entirely hers alone. Politically-incorrect, I know, especially if you're young; when you're older, and a "graduate" so to speak, not so much.If you take care to listen to the script, and to note the artistic skill and significance in the composition of nearly every frame, there is a great deal more than a Simon & Garfunkel soundtrack in this top movie.
Movie comment on L'enfant
Neville
Here's the thing: the male character is the central protagonist, and the child of the title.The main tussle is not only between a sociopath and his responsibility to others, and impact upon them; but also between value and price in a culture in which the idea of earning something by working for it (instead of by stealing) seems to be only for losers. "Only ****ers work."
A profound and intensely framed moral tale.
Movie comment on Martha Marcy May Marlene
Neville
Good comment, rtrench.Two themes stood out for me: first, the sinister Manson-Jonestown dimension to a set of decayed 60s mantras, like "There are other ways of living" and "Just exist". With a Deliverance or Winter's Bone element as well.
And the second is the ambiguous line between real, mind warping terror and paranoid schizophrenia.
A terrific film, although one I'd hesitate to make a favorite.
Movie comment on Tiny Furniture
Neville
Here's the thing: the film itself is the real content of "Tiny Furniture". It sets off the lost, disoriented experiences by simply being there, and so the apparent aimless emptiness is neither aimless or empty because it is (in)visibly filled by the film. What comes through is a compasionate intelligence and self-reflective artistry, or better, a turning of lived experience into art. Consider how much would have gone into writing it, scrpting the family quarrels for instance. It's not so easy to capture the ordinariness of ordinary NY urban life, and even more difficult to turn it into something with a shape and meaning.The key scene which "explains" it, the "reveal", so to speak, of the filmmaker who is also the main player, comes in the last shot, in her mother's words before sleep. Completely well done, and deserves to be more widely seen.Movie comment on Love and Death
Neville
"What a novel idea ..."Has anyone made a list of all the great Russian novels played with in this scene? In the whole movie?
Toplist comment on Guide for the Film Fanatic
Neville
Vote of thanks tbj.Like many others, I too got hold of a used copy of the Guide, found FilmFanatic.org online, and now am delighted that "the list" made it onto iCheckmovies.com - which amongst other things is the best "list of lists" and cloud-memory for any film lover. Danny Peary's original reviews stand out from the ruck for freshness and honesty.
Movie comment on Les parapluies de Cherbourg
Neville
Completely original and should have won the Oscar.I remember as a teenager being deeply moved by it when it first came out; now many years later it again struck me as fresh.
It wears its formality lightly: even though every word is sung, the dialogue is close to natural, if slower than normal. Deep, rich, saturated (Eastman)color complements the depth of emotion. In the background is grand opera: Bizet's Carmen's tragic Romeo-and-Juliet theme in counterpoint.
Movie comment on Trois couleurs: Blanc
Neville
Yes, definitely underrated. It has elements of the "tale fantastic" but it is most effective not in terms of realism - or lack of it - but rather the psychology of sex. Both protagonists begin the story at opposite emotional poles, and move through carefully plotted scenes of humiliation, revenge, compassion, and effectively the equivalent of rape to restore "normal" conditions of mutual love.Especially notable are the cross-references to Blue (Juliette Binoche blunders into the early courtroom scene) and Red (check the sheets of Julie Delpy's hotel room bed where the "lovers" re-unite). And there's a mysterious appearance of a figure next to Zamachowski as he buys a bottle of vodka ...
There's also some significance to the director's choice to put the title in Polish ("Is it because I cannot speak French? ...").
Movie comment on High Sierra
Neville
It's easy to judge harshly from where we are, but historically at least this movie marked a couple of important steps, including establishing Bogart as a leading man and spawning several remakes both as a gangster flick and a Western.Showing items 1 – 25 of 57