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Author Topic: Shocktober Group Marathon 2018  (Read 31098 times)

Sandy

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Re: Shocktober Group Marathon 2018
« Reply #170 on: November 01, 2018, 10:35:05 PM »

1SO

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Re: Shocktober Group Marathon 2018
« Reply #171 on: November 02, 2018, 01:02:23 AM »
Very tired, but I don't want to leave this for tomorrow.


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Preminger reminds me, once again, of a con man trying to pass off forgeries as his own work — not for money so much as for the acclaim and validation that he desperately seems to crave. I'm not sure when I became so prejudiced against him (or if my prejudice is at all justified), but I nonetheless resist his showmanship, which usually seems less in the service of the story than of his own self-aggrandizement.

I've always tried to figure Preminger out, and I think you may have it. The closest I got was comparing him to Erich von Stroheim, but I dismissed it as lumping in Austrian filmmakers. I would use ostentatious and self-aggrandizement to describe von Stroheim, but when it works for him the films are doing something really special and unique. I can't say that about Preminger, who strikes me as someone who wants to seen as a John Huston or Sam Fuller, but has never had a drink while working and would never provoke a fight. The cigar he's chewing on stays unlit.

I was only able to find a trailer that heavily featured the Zombies music AND was narrated by Preminger who appears and makes the publicity gambit. That Zombies song is the worst thing about the film because of how it's incorporated, but as a piece of trailer tension, it's pretty good.

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Atmosphere is a strong point of the film. It would make an interesting double feature with The Loved One, made the same year, or perhaps any number of subsequent films it perhaps inspired: Blowup, Rosemary's Baby, The Wicker Man.
Good atmosphere is always something I heavily credited to the director, for pulling together the skilled craftsmen - Cinematographer, Editor, Composer - into a striking single vision.
The Loved One is now on my Watchlist.

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Anyone watching 2001 for the first time should have to first watch Bunny Lake Is Missing as a prerequisite.
Is this because of Keir Dullea's performance?

pixote

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Re: Shocktober Group Marathon 2018
« Reply #172 on: November 02, 2018, 03:08:07 PM »
Thanks for the reply. I always think of DeMille more than von Stroheim, keeping it in the Sunset Blvd family. The weirdest thing about the presence of The Zombies is that they don't perform "She's Not There" in a film about a missing girl. I mean, wtf.

A caveat on The Loved One: I didn't get that film at all, but that was a long time ago. It's certainly not without interest, to say the least.

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Anyone watching 2001 for the first time should have to first watch Bunny Lake Is Missing as a prerequisite.
Is this because of Keir Dullea's performance?

Yes! I think his work here totally informs his presence in Kubrick's film. And I heard afterwards that Kubrick in fact cast him specifically because of Bunny Lake, foregoing even a rehearsal. Which makes complete sense. (In some ways, he plays HAL here, lol.)

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Knocked Out Loaded

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Re: Shocktober Group Marathon 2018
« Reply #173 on: November 05, 2018, 06:23:33 AM »
Invisible Ghost (Joseph H. Lewis, 1941)

This movie has both a horror and a thriller tag at the IMDb, but it plays like a mystery for most of the time. Maybe the horror classification is there because of Bela Lugosi, who is the lead actor. He plays Charles Kessler who still celebrates his wedding anniversary, despite the fact that his wife is missing after an accident. We later find out that she is hiding at the gardener's place. Their daughter Virginia is in a relationship, but still lives with her father and it turns out that her fiancé earlier on has had a relation with the house maid. The maid is found dead in her bed one morning and later the gardener also shows up dead....

Stupid plot and subpar dialogue left everyone stranded on a desolated shore here.

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Sandy

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Re: Shocktober Group Marathon 2018
« Reply #174 on: November 08, 2018, 09:49:20 PM »
Invisible Ghost
15°

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Why do I get all the lame ones! :D



These are my last two for this Shocktober.

An American Werewolf in London

Pan's Labyrinth

oldkid

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Re: Shocktober Group Marathon 2018
« Reply #175 on: November 08, 2018, 11:36:00 PM »
Just because it's safe for you, that doesn't mean that the film is FOR you.  I'm glad that you have moved beyond "safe" films this year to watch some wonderful-- well, really good-- horror classics.
"It's not art unless it has the potential to be a disaster." Bansky

1SO

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Re: Shocktober Group Marathon 2018
« Reply #176 on: November 09, 2018, 12:57:58 AM »
All month I kept thinking we need to rename the label. Sandy's done very well venturing beyond the safe stuff and there's a condescending/mansplaining tone to it now I don't care for.

And I gave you a quartet of non-lame recommendations this year:
My Cousin Rachel
Chase a Crooked Shadow
The Smiling Ghost
The Ninth Guest