Author Topic: The Top 100 Club (Sept 2015 - May 2017)  (Read 329111 times)

ses

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Re: The Top 100 Club
« Reply #3420 on: May 31, 2017, 10:43:58 PM »
I've had kind of a weird month, I started A Man for All Seasons, and I just couldn't get into it, tried to stream Dawn of the Dead, but the quality was so bad it was distracting, so I finally settled on The Life of Brian because it had been many, many years since I first saw it.  I will have a review up this evening.

The Life of Brian (Terry Jones, 1979)

After struggling to find the right film to watch I settled on The Life of Brian, mainly because I had seen it many, many years ago, and I didn't connect with it the way I had with The Holy Grail or Time Bandits or The Flying Circus. I figured that being older I may have missed something in my youth.   Unfortunately, it still didn't resonate for me.  I found the humor lacking and not as prominent as in the other films/shows I mentioned.  There seemed to be long lulls without a laugh and a lot of screeching by the men portraying women in the film.  I wish this one was a redemption watch for me, but sadly it wasn't.  I'm sorry Teproc that I wasn't able to find a film to connect with this month.  I promise the next go round, I will make time for two films on your list. 


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Sandy

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Re: The Top 100 Club
« Reply #3421 on: May 31, 2017, 10:50:19 PM »
Some months are like that, ses. Here's to a more successful, film watching June! :)


Wonderful rewiew as always Sandy. I was also very impressed by the virtuosity at play with the camera, and of course the absence of title cards for the most part. The silents I've seen so far all seem to have strong connections to other art forms, be it literature, opera or theater, but The Last Laugh is pure cinema. It's incredibly impressive as well as deeply affecting, especially with that bittersweet epilogue.

Thank you, Teproc. :)

"pure cinema" hmmm, yes. a whole new art form and it doesn't look back!

Sandy

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Re: The Top 100 Club
« Reply #3422 on: June 01, 2017, 02:42:03 AM »
Cabaret

http://i2.cdn.cnn.com/cnnnext/dam/assets/130208201231-cabaret-story-top.jpg

Songs echo story as they play out on the cabaret stage. Story echos the era as the Weimar Republic transitions towards the Third Reich on the world stage and Minnelli echos her mother as she proves she is born for the stage.

I imagine myself walking down Kurfürstendamm in Berlin, turning down a side street and tucking into an unassuming cabaret, expecting nothing but 1930's dingy debauchery, but instead getting hit over the head with this:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=moOamKxW844&t=2m15s#no

She doesn't belong here in this dive. She belongs in Carnegie Hall. Well, this I don't have to imagine, because Liza Minnelli "holds the record for the most consecutive performances by an individual in the Hall's history." 17 glorious sold out nights and another chance to echo her mother's time there in 1961, which was known as "the greatest night in showbiz history."

P.S. If Liza is the heart of Cabaret, Joel Grey is the feet that keeps it moving along and Bob Fosse is the jazz hands. Sheesh, no one does better turned-in, anti ballet posture than him!


DarkeningHumour

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Re: The Top 100 Club
« Reply #3424 on: June 01, 2017, 07:03:54 AM »
Sorry about being late with my submission. I got Cabaret for Merry May so I will try to watch it soon.
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DarkeningHumour

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Re: The Top 100 Club
« Reply #3425 on: June 01, 2017, 07:06:00 AM »
Shot
Timbuktu - Across the River

I tried.

pixote

You were right.

That shot was the best thing about that movie. I would have seconded the nomination had I been here at the time.
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DarkeningHumour

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Re: The Top 100 Club
« Reply #3426 on: June 01, 2017, 07:09:54 AM »
Interstellar (2014)

All the emotional punches were well executed? Even the « power of love » one?
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Teproc

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Re: The Top 100 Club
« Reply #3427 on: June 01, 2017, 12:14:15 PM »
Interstellar (2014)

All the emotional punches were well executed? Even the « power of love » one?

Against all odds, I think Hathaway actually nails that scene.

8 1/2

It would probably be better to wait a day to think more about this and probably would have been better to have watched without so much wine, but hey, that's Italian.  I really had little knowledge of the film other than it was considered one of the greats.  I must admit that I had seen Nine more or less, it has been played in the background a few times at a friend's place which I thought was some kind of musical sequel to this. But I am not thinking it is not so much a sequel but a musical retelling of the same story?  Not quite sure as I never watched it closely enough to follow the story but parts certainly seem to mirror this one

I am not so sure I am pulled into this as a movie as much as I am wondering how much of this is just the director trying to exercise his demons.  I sort of see how films like Barton Fink or Bird Man must have some inspiration from here as well as anything of Woody Allen when you are not sure if he is making a film or exposing his possible ugly soul, which makes it sort of fascinating.

I looked through the rest of Fellini's films and have to admit that I don't really know anything else, I always knew he was famous and it seems only because I know heard of 8 1/2.  I am not sure to explore more? Do they have a similar meta aspect to them (assuming a lot of this is meta?)...

Only downside is that I watched this from a small laptop, I can see this would be worth the blu-ray purchase on my large screen back home.

While it is obviously a personal film for Fellini, I found it to be much more than that... I don't see it as a film about directing as much as Fellini's view on life in general, with the Seventh Seal-esque final scene providing a perfect summary for it, helped immensely by Rota's score.
I've had kind of a weird month, I started A Man for All Seasons, and I just couldn't get into it, tried to stream Dawn of the Dead, but the quality was so bad it was distracting, so I finally settled on The Life of Brian because it had been many, many years since I first saw it.  I will have a review up this evening.

The Life of Brian (Terry Jones, 1979)

After struggling to find the right film to watch I settled on The Life of Brian, mainly because I had seen it many, many years ago, and I didn't connect with it the way I had with The Holy Grail or Time Bandits or The Flying Circus. I figured that being older I may have missed something in my youth.   Unfortunately, it still didn't resonate for me.  I found the humor lacking and not as prominent as in the other films/shows I mentioned.  There seemed to be long lulls without a laugh and a lot of screeching by the men portraying women in the film.  I wish this one was a redemption watch for me, but sadly it wasn't.  I'm sorry Teproc that I wasn't able to find a film to connect with this month.  I promise the next go round, I will make time for two films on your list. 

Don't worry about it.  ;)

I don't think it's necessarily that surprising that you could have trouble with Life of Brian while enjoying Holy Grail a lot more. The latter is much closer to Monty Python's roots in sketch comedy, and perhaps funnier overall (though there is still sketch-like stuff like the People's Front of Judea/Judea's People Front)... but where I personally connect to Life of Brian more is that it's much more of a coherent film, a pointed satire of religion, and yet another film that I find to be elevated by a perfect musical ending.

Cabaret

http://i2.cdn.cnn.com/cnnnext/dam/assets/130208201231-cabaret-story-top.jpg

Songs echo story as they play out on the cabaret stage. Story echos the era as the Weimar Republic transitions towards the Third Reich on the world stage and Minnelli echos her mother as she proves she is born for the stage.

I imagine myself walking down Kurfürstendamm in Berlin, turning down a side street and tucking into an unassuming cabaret, expecting nothing but 1930's dingy debauchery, but instead getting hit over the head with this:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=moOamKxW844&t=2m15s#no

She doesn't belong here in this dive. She belongs in Carnegie Hall. Well, this I don't have to imagine, because Liza Minnelli "holds the record for the most consecutive performances by an individual in the Hall's history." 17 glorious sold out nights and another chance to echo her mother's time there in 1961, which was known as "the greatest night in showbiz history."

P.S. If Liza is the heart of Cabaret, Joel Grey is the feet that keeps it moving along and Bob Fosse is the jazz hands. Sheesh, no one does better turned-in, anti ballet posture than him!

Minnelli really is impressive in Cabaret, and Grey really embodies the strangely engrossing/unsettling excess of the era. As for Fosse, you're reminding me I should get to All That Jazz.
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DarkeningHumour

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Re: The Top 100 Club
« Reply #3428 on: June 01, 2017, 12:17:54 PM »
The movie is in my Top 100 and even I had to go « Oh...no, no no. ».
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pixote

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Re: The Top 100 Club
« Reply #3429 on: June 01, 2017, 12:20:00 PM »
Assault on Precinct 13  (John Carpenter, 1976)

I never found myself thinking about the plot watching this. If you say there are inconsistencies, I'll believe you, but I was so into it as a thriller that I just didn't see them at all. I guess the coincidences don't bother me because there is a supernatural tinge to the whole thing that kind of justifies them. The score plays a huge role there, and it really is an embodiment of the film: very simple, but incredibly efficient. I also don't get what's wrong with the acting, but I seem to be alone there.

There are a few moments that are borderline camp (perhaps successfully, perhaps not). The one that lingers in memory is the cops in the squad car failing to notice that the police station is riddled with bullet holes, with the windows all blown out; and they drive away with one cop somewhat convinced there was something funny about the station but he just can't put a finger on it.

The one guy camping in the backseat of a potential getaway car (with the door locked) is also a wee bit of a stretch, albeit a fun one (more or less).

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