Author Topic: The Top 100 Club (Mar 2013 - Aug 2015)  (Read 441768 times)

Sandy

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Re: The Top 100 Club
« Reply #1210 on: November 01, 2013, 09:15:46 AM »
Sandy, I'm still planning on catching up with the other version of Jane Eyre.

 :)

Let me know when you watch it and I will too. It's been a long time since I've seen it.

Junior

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Re: The Top 100 Club
« Reply #1211 on: November 01, 2013, 12:00:12 PM »
Isn't this the kind of movie that isn't made anymore? The movie for adults about adult things?
Having just seen Kore-eda's Like Father, Like Son this afternoon, I was reminded, again, just how much I love his work, for he is the kind of filmmaker who offers us the same patience, the same complexity of relationships that Leigh does here. Have you seen Still Walking?

I've seen 0 Kore-eda movies and this was my first Leigh, I think. Some catching up to do!
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oneaprilday

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Re: The Top 100 Club
« Reply #1212 on: November 01, 2013, 12:38:13 PM »
I've seen 0 Kore-eda movies and this was my first Leigh, I think. Some catching up to do!
You're in for a treat!

Junior

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Re: The Top 100 Club
« Reply #1213 on: November 01, 2013, 01:10:45 PM »
My body is ready!
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Junior

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Re: The Top 100 Club
« Reply #1214 on: November 01, 2013, 01:31:11 PM »
Me and PA have 6 movies in common in the top 100 (both my number one and his are on each list). Will look to watch at least one from this selection:

Scenes from a Marriage
Sleuth
Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf
Hannah and Her Sisters
The Red Shoes
Persona
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Eldog

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Re: The Top 100 Club
« Reply #1215 on: November 02, 2013, 08:32:13 PM »
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004, dir Michel Gondry)

Despite being less than a decade since its release, this film was ripe for my "Renaissance Re-watches" list. Thanks largely to my devotion to the podcast, the dormant cinephile in me has been awakened and my past 18 months viewing has been prolific and dominated by highly regarded foreign and classic cinema. It has also led me to re-watch and reconsider some films that I probably wasn't cinematically savvy enough to appreciate. Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind is one such film.

This film plays out as a romantic comedy for the mentally unbalanced. Joel (Jim Carrey) falls somewhere on the high functioning end of the autism spectrum while Clementine (Kate Winslet) is susceptible to mood swings and bouts of depression. Both are full of self loathing. Their relationship is awkward and on borrowed time from the beginning so it is hardly surprising that they take such extremes measures when things go pear-shaped. But despite their efforts, romantic destiny can not be avoided.

The casting is spot on. If this was the first Jim Carrey film that you ever saw, it would be pretty much all downhill from here. He is incredible and makes you wonder why he has chosen buffoonery as his go to acting style.  Kate Winslett does manic perfectly and balances Carrey's predominantly melancholic performance. The supporting cast of Kirsten Dunst, Mark Ruffalo, Elijah Wood and Tom Wilkinson are all great also. The Dunst subplot gave the film another dimension and opened up many questions that largely remained ambiguous.

Gondry's surrealistic direction perfectly compliments Charlie Kaufman's script. The sequences involving the dissolution of Joel's memories and his surroundings disintegrating around him were mesmerizing. In fact, you could feel his anguish and despair when he realized he had made the wrong decision but was helpless to reverse it despite all his efforts. The dream sequences also allowed Gondry creative freedom that is not possible in the "real" world. The scenes with the young Joel were especially touching and clever as they brooched issues from his childhood such as being the subject of bullying as well as parental neglect without overdramatizing them.

8.5/10 (Pre "Renaissance Re-watches" - 7/10)

   

PeacefulAnarchy

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Re: The Top 100 Club
« Reply #1216 on: November 02, 2013, 08:52:32 PM »
He is incredible and makes you wonder why he has chosen buffoonery as his go to acting style.
Money is my guess. He does have a few other great performances, Man on the Moon comes to mind.

Quote
Kate Winslett does manic perfectly and balances Carrey's predominantly melancholic performance. The supporting cast of Kirsten Dunst, Mark Ruffalo, Elijah Wood and Tom Wilkinson are all great also. The Dunst subplot gave the film another dimension and opened up many questions that largely remained ambiguous.
Yeah the cast is definitely a great strength, particularly Winslet. She really captures the contrast between surface ideal and the underlying difficult realities.

Quote
Gondry's surrealistic direction perfectly compliments Charlie Kaufman's script. The sequences involving the dissolution of Joel's memories and his surroundings disintegrating around him were mesmerizing. In fact, you could feel his anguish and despair when he realized he had made the wrong decision but was helpless to reverse it despite all his efforts.
Yeah, I think the way Gondry captures the mood in those scenes it what raises this a notch higher than Kaufman's other films, which I also love.

Glad you liked it more this time.

Bondo

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Re: The Top 100 Club
« Reply #1217 on: November 03, 2013, 02:00:32 AM »
Limelight (1952)

Charlie Chaplin is enjoyable because he is a talented physical comedian but what really has made him my favorite of the silent era comedians is the heart he brings to his stories. Give it to a good socialist to make films appreciating the plight of the down and out (and to a good socialist for appreciating those stories). Limelight would fall in the middle of the pack among Chaplin's features for me, but in many ways it boosts his credibility because it shows a bit more variety. While he still does quite a bit with his body, he generates a lot of comedy here out of the writing as well. His character, Calvero, may be a meta-evolution of The Tramp, but in not having that character's aloof nature, it brings an extra level of soulfulness.

The stage is set as Calvero, a vaudeville clown/comic past his prime, rescues Thereza (Claire Bloom), a sickly dancer who seems to have attempted suicide and ends up stuck with her in his apartment while she recovers. In this time he acts as a mentor and almost spiritual advisor to get her back on track in show business, though she is often just as much as a force in encouraging him. Given Chaplin's own history, I was pondering whether this would turn into a May-December situation and while it doesn't avoid overtures in that direction completely, it is more graceful about it than many films, even throwing in an oblique reference to impotence to reduce the potential for that interpretation.

This isn't something that had a profound emotional effect on me but it was enjoyable and sensitive. It feels a bit padded at over two hours, full with enough scenes of his performances as well as Thereza's dancing, though both are done at a high enough quality to not completely throw off the pacing. At this point Monsieur Verdoux is the main remaining gap in my Chaplin education.

3.5/5

Jared

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Re: The Top 100 Club
« Reply #1218 on: November 03, 2013, 12:12:41 PM »
Titicut Follies

Wiseman was my biggest cinematic blind spot. I hadn't seen a single one of his films, as he is criminally unavailable on Netflix, my library, and TCM, and I can't find any streams of most of his films online. Fortunately however, I dug around for this one and found it.

The movie is a documentary about the Bridgewater State Hospital in Massachusetts. We watch the inmates get washed, fed (often by force), and other portions of their daily routine. It becomes obvious pretty much right from the start that its an extremely degrading existence. The inmates are bullied by the guards. They are often forced to strip naked when they are cleaned.

The filmmakers intent to display this atrocity is obvious enough, but it is amazing how matter of fact the camera seems. The impact is heightened by the documenting of the situation being so seemingly indifferent. I don't feel like there is ever a zoom to make a point to the viewer. I don't feel as if there is a line of questioning to "trap" any of the subjects.

I look forward to checking out more of Wiseman's stuff, should I be able to find it.

Bondo

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Re: The Top 100 Club
« Reply #1219 on: November 03, 2013, 12:33:50 PM »
I've liked a fair few of the Wiseman films I've seen (about ten at this point) but Titicut is one that kind of bothered me. Part of this is to the degree it was supposed to be showing horrible conditions, I didn't see it as being that horrible (the circumstance are horrible, not sure they could do much to make them distinctly less so), though I'm not sure that is actually the film's point. My main issue was finding it kind of exploitative of the subjects. However noble the goal of the documentary, I just feel like I'm seeing things that shouldn't be displayed to the public. The court system agreed and did a lot to lock the film away until those involved wouldn't be able to suffer as a result.

 

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