Author Topic: August 2012 MDC: 1974 Retrospots  (Read 13897 times)

ses

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Re: August 2012 MDC: 1974 Retrospots
« Reply #20 on: August 02, 2012, 01:19:07 PM »
The Conversation is brilliant.
"It's a fool who looks for logic in the chambers of the human heart"

http://sarahskitchenadventures.blogspot.com/

tjwells

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Re: August 2012 MDC: 1974 Retrospots
« Reply #21 on: August 02, 2012, 01:27:28 PM »
The Conversation is brilliant.

Yup. May be going a little far, but I still think it's Coppola's best film.

MartinTeller

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Re: August 2012 MDC: 1974 Retrospots
« Reply #22 on: August 02, 2012, 09:59:46 PM »
manana will be watching:


maņana

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Re: August 2012 MDC: 1974 Retrospots
« Reply #23 on: August 03, 2012, 08:16:48 AM »
PeacefulAnarchy will be watching experiencing:



Phantom of the Paradise - Brian De Palma, 1974 
There's no deceit in the cauliflower.

Jared

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Re: August 2012 MDC: 1974 Retrospots
« Reply #24 on: August 03, 2012, 10:01:02 AM »
KasperL gets A Woman Under the Influence



PeacefulAnarchy

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Re: August 2012 MDC: 1974 Retrospots
« Reply #25 on: August 03, 2012, 12:23:11 PM »
Jared will be watching Wim Wenders' Alice in den stadten, a hopefully safer choice than Celine and Julie and equally great.

1SO

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Re: August 2012 MDC: 1974 Retrospots
« Reply #26 on: August 04, 2012, 10:19:06 AM »
Dirty Mary, Crazy Larry
* 1/2

I'm now even more confident in my praise of Gone in 60 Seconds. Here's a film with a "screenwriter" and "professional" actors who do a much worse job than H.B. Halicki and his gang of amateurs. Peter Fonda seems disconnected most of the time, with bouts of bravado that slide back into an attitude of "Hey man, it's all in good fun" grooviness. (Even Owen Wilson has never appeared this lazy on screen.) If I hadn't seen Susan George in Straw Dogs I'd have thought the filmmakers won her in a beauty contest. The performance made me long for someone with the talent of Denise Richards.

They're not helped in any way by the dialogue which includes such cringers as "If you try another stunt like that again, I'm gonna braid your tits." and "Every bone in her crotch. That's what I'm going to break." How about this fight between Larry and Mary...

Mary: You don't know how to say hello, and you don't know how to say goodbye.
Larry: All right, I didn't say goodbye. I had a robbery to pull this morning, woman!
Mary: Well, all right. It's not actually the goodbyes. What pisses me is you didn't even leave me a clean towel!
Larry: Oh, God, if it hadn't been the goodbyes, if it hadn't been the towels, it would've been something else. You know why? Because that's the kind of person you are. You know that? You're the kind that's never satisfied. You'd eat the last cookie in the jar!
Mary: And I'm telling you something - there's no more cookies in the jar, and there aren't.
Larry: But even if there was, you'd eat it! And you'd go looking in my fridge for my pie stash!

Everybody signed off on this. They were happy with it. Thought it was a good day's work.

The car chase finale is very by-the-numbers, except for some nifty moments involving a helicopter trying to stop Crazy Larry. Again, it made me appreciate the DIY approach used in Gone in 60 Seconds. That film had an honesty about it. This was like Hollywood trying to make a cheap movie and tap into the youth market, but none of it felt genuine.

I feel bad because this was obviously dictated to me with good intentions. Even if tjwells isn't a big supporter of the film, it was at least under the belief that I would get some thrills out of it. Maybe it was a good film to watch growing up. I enjoy Smokey and the Bandit on those terms, and this made me wish that film was a 1974 release.

sdedalus

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Re: August 2012 MDC: 1974 Retrospots
« Reply #27 on: August 04, 2012, 11:29:56 AM »
Speaking of, pixote will be watching the ineffable:


The End of Cinema

Seattle Screen Scene

"He was some kind of a man. What does it matter what you say about people?"

Jared

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Re: August 2012 MDC: 1974 Retrospots
« Reply #28 on: August 04, 2012, 01:43:13 PM »
Alice in the Cities


Ive really liked the Wenders films Ive seen (Paris, Texas and Wings of Desire) but for some reason havent taken the time to explore his filmography a bit. This is a film thatll make me do so, because I loved it.

The movie is about a writer named Phil Winter, living in the US, who decides to Germany. At the travel agency he meets a mother and daughter who also need to make it to the same destination. A workers strike prevents direct flight to Germany so they elect to go to Amsterdam the next day, that being their best availible option. The next day, Winter finds he is alone with the daughter, Alice, and recieves a letter from the mother asking that he take Alice with him on the flight.

Upon arrival in Europe, Phil is stuck with Alice, and with no real idea what to do with her when the mother doesnt arrive. They go out to find Alice's grandmother, based only on her vague memory (in one comical scene where Winter is brimming with annoyance and aggrevation she states that they are looking for "an old house" with "trees", and can provide no additional description).

The movie is shot in black and white and the cinematography is terrific as one would expect from Wenders. The score is wonderful, especially during the occasional long scenes where the main characters are travelling or wandering about. 1974 has a lot of my favorites in it, but thisll probably sneak into my BP nominations

Probably Nominations: Best Picture, Original Screenplay, Best Director, Best Score, Best Cinematography, Best Editing, Best Actor, Best Actress
 

toro913

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Re: August 2012 MDC: 1974 Retrospots
« Reply #29 on: August 07, 2012, 01:02:00 AM »
MartinTeller will be watching:


 

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