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Author Topic: 1980s US Bracket: Verdicts  (Read 395754 times)

Emiliana

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Re: 1980s US Bracket: Verdicts
« Reply #270 on: October 13, 2009, 01:28:40 AM »
Coming to America used to be on TV all the time when I was young, so I have seen it lots of times, but funnily enough, never in English. I absolutely adore that film, but by the end of your reviews, roujin, you had convinced me that I now really want to see Kiss of the Spiderwoman, it sounds pretty great. 

ferris

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Re: 1980s US Bracket: Verdicts
« Reply #271 on: October 13, 2009, 12:11:47 PM »
I can go along with this pick.
"And if thou refuse to let them go, behold, I will smite all thy borders with frogs" - Exodus 8:2 KJV
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skjerva

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Re: 1980s US Bracket: Verdicts
« Reply #272 on: October 13, 2009, 09:22:29 PM »
Anyway, even though SOUL GLO is probably the epitome of 80s American cinema, I'm gonna give it to Kiss of the Spider Woman because it seems not a lot of people have seen it and although I do have problems with it, it still manages to very thematically and emotionally resonant while being very dramatic and entertaining. give it to me, broheem...

great write-up. perhaps CtA will get resurrected?  i'm looking forward to KotSW.  if i'm not mistaken, next up:

Return of the Jedi
versus
Mala Noche


oops, i mean:

Border Radio
versus
River's Edge

enjoy :)
« Last Edit: October 13, 2009, 09:29:30 PM by skjerva »
But I wish the public could, in the midst of its pleasures, see how blatantly it is being spoon-fed, and ask for slightly better dreams. 
                        - Iris Barry from "The Public's Pleasure" (1926)

'Noke

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Re: 1980s US Bracket: Verdicts
« Reply #273 on: October 15, 2009, 04:36:32 PM »

The Last Temptation of Christ

My father is a person who has many guests over to the house constantly and one time last year we had a man who was a film buff but also a Christian priest, and dealt mainly in the religious aspects of film. Now, this was a very religious man. Straight down the line, bible is everything Christian. I recently had the chance to read his book, Movies that matter, a list of Christian movies. Its ok, it’s not incredibly incisive. The book includes some normal picks, your Shawshank’s, your Philadelphia’s, although it also strangely had the Three Colours Trilogy. But I digress. The final entry was Passion of the Christ and I was surprised to see that Last Temptation of Christ was not. It seemed like it should. It’s also about crucifixion and is a very good movie. But the more I think about it, the more it made sense.

Scorsese has always been a Christian man, but not like my friend. He has wrestled with the subject in his movies, as shown even by the opening line of his breakthrough into film. “You don't make up for your sins in church. You do it in the streets. You do it at home. The rest is bullshit and you know it.” He seems like a man who wants to devote himself to good but is always in conflict with the contents of the bible.

And never more explicitly then here. Jesus is not the messiah. He is a man confused by his power, a man who is not able to take the handle of the leader of men. Jesus is never head strong. He goes from peace to hate to hard love to parables and it feels so great to watch someone deal with Jesus in such a way. He fails. Jesus fails at something. Scorsese feels like the Jesus of the bible feels false and I’m so happy he decided to challenge these preconceived notions.

This is the most apparent in the last thirty minutes, and I won’t try and spoil the movie too much, but if you haven’t seen last temptation I would recommend you skip this paragraph. We watch Dafoe destroy himself on the cross in order to serve the people but then Scorsese gives Jesus the chance to leave the cross, and he takes it! I love how he does that because it’s what I’ve been talking about all this time, that Jesus wavers and is not the perfect messiah. He is the messiah, but he’s not the ideal one. He doesn’t want this. And then we get the Harvey Keitel Confrontation scene, which is amazing. When Jesus gets confronted for not caring enough to save the people, and it has such an emotional punch.

The cinematography is great as well, because Scorsese doesn’t lose his style completely in order to make a biblical epic. There may be no virtuoso colca cabana shots, but his quick tracks and cuts fit with his Christian confrontational style of story.

I love Willem Dafoe, and I don’t think he’s gotten a role better then this. He captures the confusion, the love, the anger, the melting pot of emtions that is Martin Scorsese’s Jesus. He gives a masterful performance. I also like Harvey Keitel, who surprisingly worked in a biblical epic which I was not expecting.


Najavo Talking Picture

Najavo Talking Picture is a strange beast. It feels strange because if this movie was directed by someone else, it would be a very good film. But it felt strange that it was directed Arlene Bowman herself, it feels strange. Because it worked best a look at this character of Bowman, of her naivety of trying to film someone whose culture is one that believes filmmaking is not a valuable exercise.

Najavo Talking Picture is a student documentary following a descendant of the Najavo’s who has very much been assimilated into American culture and she makes a film about her grandmother whose life is very much rooted in Najavo Tradition.

The first half of Najavo Talking Picture is Bowman describing her mother and her relationship with her mother. The other half consists of a confrontation between Bowman and her mother over the movie and that’s where the interest in this movie lies for me. I was fascinated by the naivety of Bowman, who seems to be challenging the lifestyle her mother has created for herself.

It’s well edited by Bowman, and you would think she was editing a different person’s movie because she shows the situation as it lays. She doesn't make herself seem the hero, she lets the audience decide. It’s nice to see that in a world where documentarians can be susceptible to bias, that there’s still some people who don’t even need to put themselves in a good light.

Verdict: I don’t know. Comparing Najavo and Last Temptation is sort of like comparing apples and oranges. Fortunately I like apples better. Last Temptation moves on.

I won’t take another matchup now Skjerva, I've got too much other stuff to do. I'll come back if I want some more.
« Last Edit: October 15, 2009, 04:39:34 PM by Mononoke »
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skjerva

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Re: 1980s US Bracket: Verdicts
« Reply #274 on: October 15, 2009, 08:50:53 PM »
Nice write-ups.  I agree that Bowman's näiveté kinda makes this much more interesting that it might otherwise be.  I thought it worked really well at raising questions around expectations of audience regarding roles such as "filmmaker" and "artist" that I think also had parallels with the explicit questions regarding identity.  Of course, there were also the issues of the ethics of documenting.  I thought there was something pretty interesting - almost charming - about the rough aesthetics of the film.  I'm glad I saw it, but it was a tall order to take on Scorsese, though I can imagine it having slipped by some more popular or quirky films of the bracket.
But I wish the public could, in the midst of its pleasures, see how blatantly it is being spoon-fed, and ask for slightly better dreams. 
                        - Iris Barry from "The Public's Pleasure" (1926)

BlueVoid

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Re: 1980s US Bracket: Verdicts
« Reply #275 on: October 15, 2009, 10:55:59 PM »
Enjoyed the writeups.  I haven't seen either, but I'm glad Temptation moved on.  Definitely on my to-watch list, while Najavo Talking Picture seems... well... not up my alley.
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ferris

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Re: 1980s US Bracket: Verdicts
« Reply #276 on: October 16, 2009, 01:40:33 AM »
El Norte (1983, Gregory Nava)  vs Repo Man (1984, Alex Cox)



El Norte

El Norte is an American and English-made independent Spanish-language film about a Mayan brother and sister attempting to escape an oppressive military regieme in in their small indigenous villiage of San Pedro, Guatamala.   (They are referred to as "Indians" in the subtitles.  No matter what the label they are clearly an unwelcome element in their own homeland.)

The film is broken up into three chapters and is labelled as such.

The flim opens with a scene of peasant workers harvesting coffee beans in the misty hills of Central America.  As work wraps up for the day there it is soon obvious that a clandestine meeting is afoot.  Some of the villiagers, unhappy with the status quo, seek to form a union and risk meeting after dusk. The line "To the rich, the peasant is just a pair of strong arms."  opens one of the central themes of this film: the haves and the have nots.  When this rendezvous ends in tragedy, our hero and heroine are forced to flee.  Our story follows our main characters through a long journey that takes them through the mountains of Central America, through the deserts and poverty of Mexico, to the dusty underbelly of Los Angeles.  The movie is a great expose on the challenge of illegals in the US and a trestice on the dichotomy of class.  It asks important questions (that are just that much more pertinent some 28 years later) about the difference between the promise of what is to be found in 'the north' and the reality once you get there.  

We are treated throughout the film with some very invocative imagery and some beautiful landscape cinematography.  I gained some important perspectives about illegals and insights on the plight of those attempting to across the border.  I suppose I never had any easy answers like the policians d'jour always seem to have on this matter.  Watching this film will likely not make the issue any more black and white!

However, the themes social econonic disparity are really heavy handed.  A more subtle approach would have been much more effective.  Just seeing the cover of a Good Housekeeping magazine in an early scene tells us everything we need to know about what's ahead.  At one point late in the film the sister remarks "In our homeland there's no place for us, they want to kill us. In Mexico, there's only poverty. And in the north, we aren't accepted...".  The comment rings hollow - they are aided by good samaritans all along their journey in three different countries - the conflict of acceptance may have been the discussion director Gregory Nava wanted to have, but it is not the story he told.  Be it through the acting or direction, I think the film really fails to convey the gravity of all the losses they have suffered and the emptiness they feel- even through the final frame.  

I really honor the story told and the lessons this film is trying to teach, but I'm sorry to say I found it quite a chore to get through.  I could see the ending coming after about an hour.  At 2:20 it could have been easily a full 30 minutes shorter.  I didn't do any research into the actor and actress playing the main roles.  I found them to be way in over their head.  I suppose I'd feel pretty bad to find out some backstory that legitimizes the performances!













Repo Man

Incidently, another film about the lower classes of Los Angeles!  Hmm didn't anticipate there being anything common to these two!

I'd seen Repo Man come and go from the theaters in the early 80's.  From the trailers I remember this looking like a Beverly Hills Cop knock off - or just another vehicle money grab for Emelio Estavez of the ever-bankable brat back.   I never saw it and quick forgot about it.  Well - it only took 30 seconds into this film for me to be completely corrected as to what universe it resides in and for me to be completely captivated by what was to come.

Well this is far from a perfect film, but I had a ton of fun with it.  You can put this in the genre of "guilty pleasure".  I've since discovered what a cult following this movie had.

Unfortunately it's been a few weeks since I put the disk back in the mail, so my thoughts aren't as fresh.  I'm going to send this movie along to the next round and let someone else elaborate more.  

Nevertheless the basic premise is that Estevez and Harry Dean Stanton are Repo Men.  They have a variety of tricks they employ to repossess cars and get them back to the lot.  They soon get caught up in a strange conspiracy involving some dudes in black suits, a strange girl and a 64 Chevy Malibu.  The beauty of this film is how it seems to reside simultaneously in two parallel worlds -one that's violent, serious, and social commentary and one that's off-beat, sarcastic and too-cool-for-school.  Suffice to say it's pretty clever.  Some nice sight gags.  

If you do watch this, make sure you get the DVD with the Alex Cox commentary and the interview with Harry Dean Stanton.  This interview is amazing I must say.  In fact, you may want to watch that interview first - because it adds a nuance to everything that happens in the film - especially some of the nihilistic overtones in key scenes with Tracy Walker.

The commentary gives you some great insights into some of the sight gags - including the little pine tree air fresheners.  It also gets into how the director and Alex Cox really had it out on a few occasions during filming.  So much so that entire scenes were rewritten with other actors.  It's not hard to figure out which scenes those are - they kinda stick out like a sore thumb.  It just adds to the camp factor.

It is definitely a film of it's time.  Heck, Estevez's earring is all you need to know about the era this was filmed in!  But great one-liners give this a timeless quality.  I'm sure there are groups of guys still quoting entire scenes line for line.  There is a bit on John Wayne being gay that - well you just wouldn't see that scene in a movie made today.

I don't anticipate this film getting two much further than the next round but it's a fun little discovery.  Glad I got to see it.





 



RESULT:  Repo Man
« Last Edit: October 16, 2009, 10:23:20 AM by ferris »
"And if thou refuse to let them go, behold, I will smite all thy borders with frogs" - Exodus 8:2 KJV
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skjerva

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Re: 1980s US Bracket: Verdicts
« Reply #277 on: October 16, 2009, 10:33:20 AM »
yay Repo Man
But I wish the public could, in the midst of its pleasures, see how blatantly it is being spoon-fed, and ask for slightly better dreams. 
                        - Iris Barry from "The Public's Pleasure" (1926)

smirnoff

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Re: 1980s US Bracket: Verdicts
« Reply #278 on: October 16, 2009, 10:52:34 AM »
Dang, I haven't seen any of these recently reviewed films before.

BlueVoid

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Re: 1980s US Bracket: Verdicts
« Reply #279 on: October 16, 2009, 12:11:46 PM »
Great reviews Ferris.  I'm dissapointed that you didn't like El Norte more since I just bought the blu-ray and I've found our tastes generally match up.  Ah well, sounds like you picked the right one to move on.
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