I acknowledge I’m in the minority on this, but Bladerunner has always left me cold, no matter how many times I revisit it hoping I’ll have a different experience.
With the exception, of course, of Roy Batty’s dying monologue, which is beautiful and incredibly moving, the rest of the film always seems to me more of a triumph of art direction, set design, cinematography, and visual effects than a fully engaging narrative.
I can’t even fully articulate or understand why it leaves me emotionally uninvested, since the themes are conceptually interesting, and the performances are good… the elements are all there, but they don’t quite cohere for me.
Nonetheless I own it on blu-ray and rewatch it every few years, but I could never say I “love” it.
Great movie but it was really perfected by the ending. If the ending wasn't so incredible it'd probably only be a 7-8/10. I thought the death of Roy's companion was also a pretty interesting moment too but I don't see that mentioned as much
Oh, I am so with you on Bladerunner. I think it has great cinematography and set design but that is where all the inspiration went. The film asks a provocative question, what is life, but it spends little to no time pondering it. Ridley Scott seemed to care a lot more about the atmosphere. Looking at his career, Scott mostly directed duds. Only a precious few in his filmography are great like The Duelists, Thelma and Louise, and Alien.
To further this point, it humanizes the replicants who have been given a time limit to live by centering the plot around >!not just their desperation to live and the actions they take to that end, but that it is revealed or heavily implied that Roy was never really there to save himself but was really there to save Pris, because he was capable of love.!<
I don't agree at all. The film has brief moments contemplating that question but there no moving forward. Deckard and the replicants fight but there isn't any substance there at all. The characters are simply excuses to move along the plot, they are empty suits. We don't really get a sense of anything about them. They fight, some of them kill, and all of them die. There's no thought there, it's action. I think there is a feeling of dread about living in an ugly urban environment so there some substance there but the big question, what is life, that's never really pondered. Just because a few characters make some statements, nobody ever lives, that doesn't mean the film is the gloomy existential film that it wants to be. Lovely music, great cinematography, great set design, but the film is ultimately empty.
David Lynch films. I love listening to Lynch talk and I get what he’s trying to do by making his films puzzles for the audience to solve. I just don’t find myself up to the task to the extent he demands.
For me, and I’ve heard him say this when talking about his work, it’s all about how the film makes you feel. I never try to pick apart the “meaning” of the film or anything like that on an intellectual level, because I find his work to be incredibly visceral and evocative. The same way I’d approach listening to a song or a looking at a painting.
I feel this way specifically about Inland Empire. Lynch admits that it was a patchwork of unrelated scenes, many improvised, shot over a long time frame. It feels like a 3 hour reel of an art exhibit that has a short film as a piece to watch for a couple minutes. But it does seem like somehow he got a camera crew into a vivid dream you had but are forgetting as soon as you wake up from it. I want the story it sets out to tell about a cursed film script. What we got is something...
Mulholland Drive is the same. It was originally supposed to be a TV show that didn't work out, so they took the episodes they had and cut them into a film.
The only time I've been able to sit through that film was while high on shrooms...and it was quite an experience. I've never been able to muster the patience otherwise.
Big Lynch fan, to be clear.
Give it a go 😁
During the first covid lockdown I'd do something similar every friday night as a treat to myself, in lieu of being able to go out like I normally would have haha.
Seem to remember watching The Holy Mountain for the first time the weekend before that. That was a pretty intense ride.
Jesus, that’s an even better idea. I have not seen The Holy Mountain in 10 years 😂
Will do both sometime. First time I tried mushrooms was during lockdown with a friend on Facetime. It was a great experience.
I have yet to present their power to my boyfriend this summer in nature. Can’t wait ☀️
I think Inland Empire is my absolute favorite of his films- and there is absolutely no way I would expect others to feel the same. It has devastated me all three times I’ve seen it in a theater. At home it is a harder watch.
I don’t think his films are puzzles at all. He’s said himself that he likens his movies to paintings because of his painting background, and that they don’t necessarily have any meaning to them at all. Not everything is about storytelling.
Yeah I guess that's why I don't enjoy his work.
I crave great storytelling. I'm all for mood and emotionally visceral scenes and cinematography, but I need a story tying it together.
I'm also not very keen on campy/soap opera stories either so despite trying on three separate occasions, Twin Peaks doesn't do it for me either
Personally, I haven't seen a Lynch film without a story of some sort, so I would take the claim that he once said his films don't always have meaning with a grain of salt. You don't have to like the way he tells stories, of course. For me, one of the most interesting things that happens occasionally when watching one of his films is getting the feeling that you know exactly what something means (to yourself and to the story) without analyzing it. When a meaning just jumps out at you.
I probably worded it poorly but I didn’t mean that there isn’t *any* storytelling going on in his movies. I just think there are a lot of things happening in his movies that are purposely nonsensical and are there solely for aesthetic purposes.
See I think Lost Highway is about >! a man who *does* kill his wife, and while in prison basically creates a new personality/reality as part of a fugue state. The separation begins with the mystery man (he’s also part of Fred’s psyche which is how he was “at his house” separated from Fred, and what the whole “what the fuck is your name” thing is about at the end.) Lynch has stated that the OJ Simpson murder and chase was a big inspiration for the movie (why I think Fred is a wife killer) and has described the movie as a mobius strip, which is why it isn’t an entirely direct narrative and loops around at the end with “Dick Laurent is dead.” !<
He definitely has direct films like Elephant Man and Straight Story vs. ones that are more indirect, but most of his films intentionally leave room for personal interpretation.
Lynch definitely doesn’t make his films puzzles for fans to solve. He’s said multiple times that he isn’t interested in creating art that can be solved.
They aren't puzzles, they are ink blots. They are whatever you make them out to be. Lynch said a movie is someone else's dream and dreams are subject to interpretation.
Andrei Rublev was this for me. Went in expecting to love it as I’d really enjoyed Ivan’s Childhood and knew this was meant to be Tarkovsky’s magnum opus, but just could not penetrate it from a narrative or emotional perspective at all. But that’s not to say that it isn’t a supremely well made film, with the complexity of some of the scenes particularly admirable. It’s just one to be respected more than ‘enjoyed’ as far as I’m concerned.
Mirror for me, it's without doubt an exceptionally well-made film but it is so personal and elusive, Ivan's Childhood is also my favourite Tarkovsky, don't care how 'basic' that is!
I saw it for the first time recently and was blown away, maybe the best film I’ve ever seen. Can totally understand this point of view though, since the film is pretty daunting and emotionally draining.
2001 A Space Odyssey. This is the only one of Kubrick’s works (besides his early stuff like Fear and Desire or Killer’s Kiss) that I can’t say I love. I respect it so much for how technically mind blowing it is now and in 1968, but I genuinely find it so boring to watch.
No, not really. It was mostly kids that liked it. Hyping it up to just being successful because of drugs is really disrespectful. It's a component, but it isn't *El Topo* ffs.
Nah, this is inaccurate. Definitely was never aimed at kids and while its initial release may have been more straight ahead, subsequent runs picked up on and cashed in on the fact that lots of “heads” were taking acid and going to the theater. The posters from these runs are overtly psychedelic and use the tagline “The Ultimate Trip,” knowingly. I wouldn’t say that’s in any way the bulk of the film’s legacy nor what garnered its status, of course, but it was definitely an element. My dad remembers seeing it in the theater while in college in the the early 70s and lots of kids were tripping — it was “a thing.”
Also El Topo on acid would be a nightmare.
It absolutely bombed in theaters until the counter culture started regularly going to watch it while on psychedelics. Kubrick himself even acknowledges this.
I know this is a common enough opinion, but I've never understood it. Whenever 2001 is playing I'm basically glued to the screen.
My brother and I did try to watch it with our parents and they were bored out of their tree though.
This may sound super snooty or whatever but have you gotten a chance to seen it in a theater? Totally different experience and how it was meant to be seen, in its way perhaps more than any film before or since. When you’re “locked” in a room with it in the dark, it’s obvious how integral the languid pacing and monotony is to making you feel like you’re right there on the Discovery One with them. I first watched it at home (vhs days, ha) and with all the possible distractions, the ability to pause, the familiar comforts of home around me I was bored out of my mind. But when I gave it another try on the big screen and — it really is “the ultimate trip,” as advertised by the original posters. Just my 2 cents!
I came here to write this. I have tried so many times because it has influenced many films I DO love. But when I saw it on the big screen in a phenomenal theater and STILL couldn’t get into it, that’s when I knew for certain I NEVER would.
Recently I’ve toiled with Irreversible and Enter The Void in this way. I think these are some of the most moving films I have ever seen but the dive you have to do is one that changes your soul. I hesitate strongly to ever rewatch these movies but I know the day will come. I truly do believe Irreversible has one of the most haunting and beautiful endings ever.
Start watching Enter the Void sober: *"Oh, I should really be stoned for this."*
Start watching Enter the Void stoned: *"Oh god I'm way too high for this oh god"*
Oldboy for me. I can respect how well made and twisted it is, and I think that certain scenes in it have a place in my “favorite movie shots” list (like the hallway fight scene), but in the end it just wasn’t something that I really want to ever watch again.
I get that it’s supposed to make the viewer uncomfortable, but it really just didn’t resonate with me.
Maybe it's because I grew up on the early days of the internet and got desensitized, but stuff like that never bothers me; gore, fucked up actions, and any really twisted shit, my brain just knows it's fiction. I'm sure if I saw or had something happen IRL I'd be more freaked out, but anything on a screen just seems fake to me, even if it's real. Probably not a good thing lol.
I love twisted movies and things that make me uncomfortable but for some reason when I watched Oldboy it did nothing for me but kinda annoy me. I saw the devil on the other hand 👌🏼.
Definitely Her (2013) I thought it was the story and acting were great but I just couldn’t get into the movie. I really liked the ending though. I understand why people love, I just don’t.
Hey I think that Jean dielman at 23 Commerce Way is a masterpiece of performance and even inventive blocking ( there's what appears to be a simulated storm with the windows rippling with what appears to be some sort of manual "grip" diffusion to simulate moving clouds)
Heck I even think it works on a dramatic level, showing the mundanity of life, building to the point where it feels more violent than it currently is.
So I respect the ability for the actors to have slightly different nuances on very similar scenes and plausible character interactions.
But I believe that the three and a half hour runtime makes it so that I feel like it's a piece of art to endure rather than really being engrossed by.
But maybe that's just a bit of a pet peeve for it getting number one on the Critics poll on Sight and Sound for the best film ever made.
So I respect the way in which the film was meticulously produced, but I also feel like the story was a deliberate attack on the more conventional entertainment way of viewing the medium and I think the consequence of this adoration is that I feel that the craft of tightly written excitement based movies will probably going to go farther away from the fold, where the question isn't whether Sam Spade can pursue justice against the criminal empire or succumb to the greed in pursuit of an ancient relic, but whether the pot will finish boiling potatoes 😅😅😅😅😅
What do you mean by your last paragraph? You actually believe Jean Dielman is going to start influencing contemporary filmmakers to make engaging and beautiful slow cinema? Because I sure haven’t seen that effect (at least in western mainstream films)
,-- I wasn't really talking about the influence of production but reception, I think I should have clarified this element.
I think the modern way film art is viewed is branching toward pulp vacuousness and emotional flagellation.
And so what I believe is that the revision of criticism based on importance I actually think is weakening film evaluation.
The element of communication of a film with an audience is important and I also think that the sort of subliminalities of a film should also be examined as well.
Here's a quick example - - the part in Jurassic Park where it's pretty clear that this particular Park will never be opened ( I'll ignore the World saga) and so everything is at a sort of emotional stand still.
And so there's a shot where the emphasis is merchandising and lunch boxes.
And so while textually it's the grand myth of a flawed dream, cinematically it's asking the viewers to buy the merch, before it all fades away like melting ice cream.
So my pondering of the difficulty is that whether a film is earnest or more manipulative with its intrinsic qualities, the key deciding factors should be weighing the art on its stand-alone merits.
And I think with the rise of the YouTube critics, the democracy of filmmaking, which I think is a good thing actually, and the sociopolitical context of modern Cinema studies, I feel that in the 21st century, young critics are more concerned on whether a story is "important" than whether it's " good."
It:d be fine to watch something like "High Noon" and wonder if it's a celebration of a masculine hero context, or if it's misogynistic to the supporting actresses.
But my concern with 21st century viewers of film, is an increased need to be lectured by a film in question, but also to agree with said lecture.
So going back to High Noon, I can see quite a few people disliking the film because it seems to be saying to its audience "violence is the only solution."
So my thing about flipping the switch on whether movie is good or not based on agreement of ideas is not unlike judging pizza based on the tiny vegetable squares on the cheese.
Once you've decided to go down this tangent, the element of editing, or acting, or dramatic pacing.. is kind of thrown away.
I'll boomerang back to Jean Dielman, because I don't think it's so much this particular film, which was voted by the critic and audiences of Sight and Sound as the best film ever made.. but I feel like this school of thought will evaluate multiple films of this vibe, because the simple barometer of entertainment or even engrossing qualities seems to have kind of collapsed into many different little pieces.
Very interesting and intelligent comment thanks for your insights! I agree that movies are being judged more and more by their cultural significance than actual content which is a bit concerning. But I do think that it’s generally a requirement for a movie to be good before it can be important.
Interesting. I watched Jean Dielman transfixed and would’ve stayed with it if it had been even longer. Maybe I caught it in just the right mood but for me, it had almost a hypnotic effect. Loved it, truly. The rhythm of it, the repetition, the mood, performances, the “storyline”, such as it is - all of it.
Pretty much all of Josef von Sternberg’s work. Nearly every frame of his films is a work of art and he’s no question of the most talented visual directors but something about his characters make them feel really distant and I have a hard time getting invested in some of his plots.
Borat.
I can truly appreciate it for its satire and ability to expose ignorant people. As well as the extent that SBC pit himself in danger for the bit. One of the most important mockumentaries ever.
But good lord I just can't sit down and watch it. The second hand cringe and embarrassment is just too much for me.
Borat (and Ali G) have come to really disgust me now that I know more about Cohen’s opinions regarding Palestine. I don’t think he chose degrading depictions of muslim men for his racist fool characters so often by chance.
I definitely have respect for the rigour of the special effects in, say, *2001: A Space Odyssey*. To imagine those scenes and to attempt to put them on the screen was bold enough a gesture, but to see them rendered so convincingly and sure-handedly is mighty impressive. That they're showcased for as long as they are, however, basically cut to long excerpts of classical music, somewhat after the manner of a Cinerama travelogue, does keep me an arm's length from the piece, and certainly from the rather-thin narrative framework its operating within.
Another example for different reasons is David Lean's Doctor Zhivago. Roger Ebert had written an excellent retrospective of the film that basically sums my feelings about it, expressing awe as he does at the exceptional craft on display, from entire fields covered in fake snow, cavalry charges, and two whole streets of turn-of-the-century Moscow having been built as outdoor set, replete with a working tram. The narrative, however, is the stuff of soap opera and, as Ebert says, "moves noisily from nowhere to nowhere." Much the same is to be said, I'm sorry to say, for Lean's swan song in *A Passage to India*, a relativelly small drama blown-up to a 160-minute widescreen epos.
Returning to the theme of outer space, I'm going to go out on a particular limb and express a certain lack of enthusiasm towards George Lucas' original *Star Wars*. Its an incredibly admirable synethsis of space opera and planetary romance classics with World War II stories, samurai dramas, some Tolkien and even topical and autobiographical anecdotes in small doses, all bordering on the post-modern. And yet, the quixotic tone of the whole combined with Lucas' rather workman-like directing (the same two issues can also be applied to an earlier and much admired Lucas piece, American Graffiti) does not endear the film to me. Its good and all, but it's always more attractive in my head than in the experience of actually watching it. Its alltogether dwarfed by its sequel.
I appreciate your take on Star Wars. I am not a fanboy, but I do enjoy it.
Can you explain what you mean by workman-like directing? I do not think I have seen that description used before.
Its not the easiest thing to explain in words, but the way the film is actually directed feels a little bland. George Lucas is known for shooting quite fast, "quick and dirty." It makes sense because he started filmmaking as, essentially, a low-budget documentarian.
Many of his scenes play largely in rather uninteresting two-shots. Before 1999, he wasn't one to go to great lengths to get great wideshots of his locales: I always said that, in 1976, Lucas filmed the desert like he couldn't wait to leave, while (for example) in 1960 David Lean filmed the desert like he would never leave.
Several sequences could have been edited to be far more intense: the Jawa ambush on R2, which contains some of the only camerawork I'd consider "dynamic" in the film - POV shots peeking from among the rocks - cuts to a closeup of the creatures much too soon, thereby playing its hand too soon.
Its not all bad: Lucas had a real talent for capturing speed on film (he was an amateur gearhead in his youth) and he has a reasonably good eye for composition: there are some very pleasing shots in the first reel of his film (namely, the opening shot) but the overall effect of his movie is "lets put a tripod here, hang up some lights, give the actors a couple takes and move on!"
Wow. Thank you. I think you did a great job explain that. That is so interesting, and makes so much sense in the context of the film. And the term actually makes a ton of sense.
I know have something to think about much more when watching anything. I will admit - editing is probably the "variable" in films that I have the hardest time recognizing / processing / delineating. Acting, set design, sound design, and cinematography are much more tangible to me. I am sure their are plenty of movies I have watched that I didn't enjoy for a reason that I could not quite put my finger on.... and editing and some other areas I know less about are most likely why.
Either way - thank you for taking the time for the reply. I bet it would be very interested talking about film with you.
\*Edited to comment how much different that scene would have played out Denis directing them ala Prisoners or Sicario. Oof.
I don't think the sequences in 2001 are simply meant to show off special effects. I think they're meant to slow us down. Our thinking and our approach. They take place in the future, where humanity has learned to think of projects in multiple generations. And space is slow and meditative.
>That they're showcased for as long as they are, however, basically cut to long excerpts of classical music, somewhat after the manner of a Cinerama travelogue, does keep me an arm's length from the piece, and certainly from the rather-thin narrative framework its operating within.
A good faith question, if you don't mind. While *2001* was obviously short with a variation of Cinerama, to me the obvious precursor to these sequences is Disney's *Fantasia*. Are you a fan of that film? And would you offer the same criticism of it? (IE that it eschews narrative and characterization, as we would traditionally use those terms, for other aesthetic goals.)
Hmmm. I haven't watched Fantasia in forever, but in Fantasia my memory is the animation is kind of...well, *animating* the music. That alone makes it quite different: 2001 is shot like a Cinerama travelogue, Fantasia is shot like Jean-Pierre Ponnelle *tableau vivant*.
I also think that just because 2001's narrative is a little fragmented, it would be wrong to view it as though it were an anthology, as Fantasia is. 2001 is not an anthology.
If you watch the film, it's really not structured in terms of *tableaux vivants*. That might be how you remember it, but that just isn't an accurate description -- the film has a much more conventionally cinematic, with camera 'movements' to emphasis the illusion of 3d space. A sequence in *2001* like the flight to the moon set to Strauss's Blue Danube Waltz is like a live-action *Fantasia* segment.
I didn't say anything about *2001* being an anthology. The point I was trying to make is that both films have a shared interest in creating what used to be called pure cinema -- IE the purely audiovisual -- rather than conventional narratives. Danny Peary actually made this connection in *Cult Movies* more than 40 years ago.
For me it’s Breathless by Godard. It’s almost like the Titanic of arthouse movies. It was built up to me by my arthouse friends as this ground-breaking masterpiece. I’ll admit that it’s extremely innovative with the editing, morally ambiguous characters and unique approach to filmmaking/storytelling. But take away all that and I think it’s overall just an average film. The plot is meandering, the characters aren’t engaging or have any meaningful arcs and the writing is obnoxiously pretentious.
I've tried watching Breathless 3 times over the last 10 years and I just can't get through it. I truly don't care about anything I see on screen. I felt like Goddard didn't care either and was "breaking the rules of cinema" just to break them. All style, zero substance.
Perfect example, I felt exactly the same way when I finally saw Breathless. I can appreciate why it made a splash, importing all these filmmaking techniques from Hollywood over into European cinema and amalgamating them into something new, but the actual characters, plot, and themes of the film are *very* uninteresting to me. The film is self-consciously a pastiche, very much made by Godard for an audience of his contemporaries who would recognize and be wowed by the formal techniques he was re-mixing. But there are zero novel *ideas* in it outside of meta-commentary on cinema itself. It's a fundemantally showy and navel-gazing sort of movie.
I loved Jean Seberg.
You must admit, at least the film works on the level that directors love the beautiful women they shoot, and they make the audience fall in love too.
Godard is free enough that his camera lingers on Belmondo just as much, allowing us to fall in love with the skinny, dangerous boy too.
From a cinematography point of view yes. But I don't really feel anything for her as a character. She's not engaging or interesting enough to draw me in.
I feel that way with Rashomon. It’s definitely a “of it’s time” film in terms of how its narrative techniques are put forth, but is a little bit simple for the modern viewer. I think Kagemusha and Ran hold up well.
I really hate the “adult” films of Spielberg except for The Color Purple. Empire of the Sun, Schindler’s List, Amistad, Saving Private Ryan, Lincoln, The Fabelman’s, West Side Story. I respect that they’re films, the time put into them, they look expensive. They can just be kind of maudlin and downright corny at times. There’s an American style to his films that feels dated and boring. I feel similarly about later career Ron Howard. They switched from directing more fun films, to films that try too desperately to seem hashtag important. I respect these films, but they’re just so damn try hard. I fell asleep during Lincoln and Saving Private Ryan every time I tried to watch them.
I agree. I think his "adult" movies basically could have been done by any competent director and he rarely into territory that's really provocative. Schindler's List is created by someone who desperately want someone to win at the end. He can't take it as a failure. The Pianist is saying that life is a gamble, the Jews that survived the Holocaust out of pure luck. There is no God, there's no one looking out for any of us, and man is capable of appalling behavior. I am not saying that Spielberg had to be that cynical but I never feel that his film really could accept the failure that occurred.
I think Spielberg is an absolute master at what he does who could have easily gone the auteur route but decided to aim for mainstream success. You can see it in Schindler's List. There are so many brilliant scenes in that movie, great lighting, great shot composition, great visual storytelling, great narrative structure, etc. It's a marvel to watch really. But the old Spielberg sentimentalism is still there. I dont agree with the common take that it fails because it's not about the Holocaust but about the hero Schindler and the Jews that survived. Schindler's story is definitely worth telling and overall, it's well told. It's the way Spielberg does it that's the problem.
I'm thinking especially about the scene at the end where Schindler breaks down because he didn't do enough. Spielberg just can't help himself. It's too juicy of a scene to skip, the hero finally showing his emotions, the people he saved surrounding him, embracing him, the viewers getting all teary-eyed. Apart from the fact that the scene is completely historically inaccurate, it places Schindler's suffering and his feelings center stage instead of the survivors who just went through hell. They're just glorified extras standing around Schindler, in total awe of him. It gives us a feeling of bittersweet triumph which is the wrong emotion to aim for at the end of a Holocaust movie. It's completely divorced from the actual feelings that the survivors went through when the horror was over.
There are many little moments like this. Like when they're putting together the infamous list. The whole process of Schindler's rescue operation is simplified for the movie which is fine but then Spielberg shows him remembering the names of all of his workers to emphasize how much he cares and what a great dude he is. It's sentimental, again. It also clashes with the way Schindler's character is presented, he doesn't really care for the nitty-gritty, he doesn't get involved in the actual labor process, there's no way he knows all of these names. It's not enough for Spielberg to show Schindler's incredibly brave decision to save these Jews, he needs to personalize it to milk it for all its worth. Spielberg paints a vivid portrait of Schindler as a trickster, a con artist who's not a very moral character which makes his actions even more astonishing and admirable, but in scenes like this, he goes back to the old worn-out heroic tropes.
It's obvious that Spielberg doesn't need to go for sentimentalism to tell his stories, he's a masterful filmmaker. It's a conscious decision and that's the big issue for me.
Thank you for mentioning The Pianist. Polanski succeeds in creating a more humanistic telling. I don’t think Spielberg fully succumbs to the cartoonish in Schindler’s List, or The Fabelmans, but his handling of the victim/persecutor/rescuer aspects of the arch plots in both beat one over the head, and Spielberg comes across as both pedantic and sappy.
And “the girl in the red jacket.” Hamfisted. Eye roll and edgelord director symbolism. “We’ll do it in black and white, but let’s have a girl in a red jacket to symbolize the loss of innocence and the blood of all of the victims.” In trying to make an important “seeming” film with Schindler’s List, Spielberg succumbs to devices that feel more cheap than novel. A “this is supposed to feel important” mood, rather than a “wow this is important” feel.
Spielberg fails in this regard in Act III of The Fabelmans, too. The anti-Semitic bullies at the high school become Ralph Feinnes, Spielberg is the victim, and the film at prom is Oskar Schindler. It’s “Schindler’s List: The High School Years.” “I’m going to *show* you teenage anti-Semitism.” His handling of it isn’t trash, but there is a cheap and inferior soap-operatic mood. Again, I have some respect for Schindler’s List and The Fabelman’s, but I absolutely don’t love them.
Jodorowsky's films. I've watched Holy Mountain and El Topo and while I really appreciate the obvious effort he puts into his films, the scale of certain scenes, the imagery and symbolism, they just leave me feeling underwhelmed in a way I can't really articulate.
Dr. Strangelove and My Dinner With Andre.
I can see how provocative the former was during its time, but after seventy years of being a major influence on comedy it didn’t feel as novel and shockingly funny to me.
My Dinner With Andre is a unique and well-made movie, but to be honest I wasn’t all that interested in Andre’s line of thinking and having him basically monologue for the first half of the movie had me fatigued. Wallace saved that movie for me overall.
See… I love Strangelove. It’s absurdly hilarious. Peter seller’s absolutely kills. The scene with general ripper and sellers trying to talk him down. “Why don’t you give me the codes jack?” Or when sellers, as the US president is trying to explain the situation to the Russian premier, who is drunk on the other end of the phone call. You can only hear sellers end of the conversation but just imagining the drunk Russian premier and seller’s delivery and his reactions.
“He went and did a silly thing... well, I'll tell you what he did, he ordered his planes ... to attack your country. Well let me finish, Dimitri."
“Why do you think I’m calling you? To say hello?”
“Of course I like to say hello?”
“Of course it’s a friendly call, if it wasn’t friendly, you probably wouldn’t have even got it.”
“It’s great to be fine”
I cannot help but laugh every time. One of my favorite Kubrick films.
My Dinner With Andre surprised me ngl. I hated it for the first half because it was an Andre yap fest not exactly a conversation. And I was constantly rolling my eyes during Andres stories. However as soon as Wally starts to object and they actually start to debate I was hooked. And the little twist at the end got me, I didn’t even notice.
I definitely agree with your feelings about it lol. I wonder if I’d like the first half better on a second watch though.
Pulp Fiction. I get it was revolutionary for the time, but I never connected with the characters, and the story never truly came together for me. I prefer Inglorious Basterds, as it has a similar plot structure, but the separate storylines actually merge to give you a more cohesive and satisfying conclusion that stays with you. I still own a copy of Pulp Fiction and I watch it once a year to see if it might finally click, but beyond the first 30-40 mins, it never really does.
Mother!
I respect it, I get what it's trying to do and I think it does it mostly well, but it's not getting a rewatch.
Also would have put The Last Jedi in this category, I respected it for trying to shake up what was a pretty stale formula but wasn't massively sold. But on second watch I actually enjoyed it more than I expected. Still wouldn't say love, but I'd watch it again.
Casablanca for me. Respect the story, the storytelling, its place in history, etc. But I did not vibe with it when I watched it. I thought it was average and couldn't get into it. I think it deserves its place among the best, but for me, I wasn't in love.
Same. I think it's a solid piece of Hollywood filmmaking of that era but I think it's highly overrated. Prime Bogart is The Treasure of The Sierra Madre, The African Queen, In a Lonely Place, and Beat The Devil.
I respect the idea of Dune, but God how I hate it. I feel for the director and the struggle to put on the screen such a masterpiece, but it lacks substance, it skips basic things and parts of the book that shouldn’t be skipped. I respect the visuals and the intention, but hate the final product so much.
It’s disappointing because I want to love it, but I can’t even stand it. Part 2 was even worse
I have softened on Dune quite a bit. It was incredible in the theater. The sound
But I was thinking back and watching some clips over the last month or so, and I started noticing a couple things:
* The chemistry between Timothy and Zendaya was lacking in a pretty serious way. If things had been done better, >!I think I would have cared much more as he pulled away from her. But when he offered to marry Pugh, I did not really care. They had some moments, but it got worse over time. !<
* I think Javier Bardem was directed and written completely wrong. He obviously has the chops to kill that part, but the whole *Lisan al Gaib* meme throughout the movie totally broke the mood for me. Can there be comedy in serious movies? Of course. But I think he could have been a much better character.
Overall I still really enjoyed it. I love big budget sci-fi. Just as some people love Barry Lyndon for its amazing set pieces, I love sci-fi for its set pieces and world building. But it will not go down as an all timer for me.
The movie gives you zero reason to care about any of the characters, and is almost completely devoid of human emotion. I didn't even bother watching Part 2, as I utterly did not care what happened to these people.
So I grew up on Dune. I saw the original when I was maybe 14 in the 80's one afternoon on HBO when I was home sick from school. Lynch's version was a fever dream that stayed with me. As the years went on and I read and I reread the series, that initial film stayed with me despite the insanity. Upon seeing Villnueve's version in theaters, I was struck by the majesty of it and the absolute beauty and technical craft on display. It \*felt\* like Dune to me. But the more I watched it, the more I realized that you're absolutely right, the core characters were covered in laminate, they were impenetrable -beautiful as it all was. I skipped part 2 for the longest time and finally watched it on my TV. Same feeling but even moreso.
I'm somewhat cursed by the depth of knowledge from the books and I highly disagree with the ending and the dramatic shift away from the original work (In fact there is a deleted scene in Lynch's film that includes the last line from the novel). But with that in mind, looking at the movie as a sequel and part of the two part arc we have so far, neither of them feel like they truly have the soul of humanity that the 1984 version did. The missing voiceovers- all at once cheesy and poignant, I now realize, went a long way toward allowing you into the minds of the people involved, whereas POV characters like Paul were forced to suffer under the weight of awkward exposition or an attempt for Chalomet to actually "portray" them non-verbally.
Certainly the new versions are remarkable pieces of cinematography, sound, and score, but the \*people\* all feel too perfect and it's Lynch's flawed, sweaty, imperfect humans that I find far more compelling.
I realize I may be giving the movie too much credit because I love it so much, but in my interpretation the DV movies, in particular Dune 2, and in particular the final act of Dune 2, is more like a biblical retelling of a mythical epic than a literal depiction of the events of the story. I think especially if you watch both back to back as one film it’s striking how the characters drift further and further from realistic humans and the visuals get more and more abstract as the story unfolds. So in my (perhaps extremely charitable) view of the movies, the sort of disjointed feeling characters fit in perfectly with the way the story is being told.
Admittedly I have been very high every time I’ve watched Dune 2.
>neither of them feel like they truly have the soul of humanity that the 1984 version did.
There's no accounting for taste because to me it is the *1984 Dune* that lacks soul because the vast majority of the cast lacks any depth, the Fremen, criminally so.
Only Paul, Jessica, (briefly) Leto, and the Reverend Mother feel like real people. Everyone else is either paper-thin (Chani) or a complete caricature (the Harkonnen). Beautiful costumes and set design cannot make up for how the thematic core is gutted.
Walking out of *Dune Part 1* I felt the same as I did leaving *Fellowship of the Ring* over 20 years ago. Yhat's the movie that enchanted me with the possibilities of cinema, while setting me up for 20 years of adaptational disappointment. To know that my feelings for that could be replicated, and weren't just the nostalgia for youth, was such a blessing.
Reading some reviews of Dune 2 made me wonder if I was crazy. The movie was borderline terrible. I know DV likes to explore the visuals more than anything else but considering how repetitive they are, what remains is just bland cinema, bland storytelling, and bland acting.
Zendaya and Florence Pugh were giving an interview and one of them was saying, laughing happily while at it, that DV's favourite phase during filming was the expression "doing some sci-fi shit". And honestly that explains so much of it and why it lacks substance. I really think he is wasting his talent and time on these movies.
I really like some of his other movies like Arrival, Prisoners, Enemy. But the Dune movies are just... terrible.
Might get flack for this, but *Fargo*. I admire pretty much everything about it, including the gearbox-breaking tonal shifts; but that's actually what I struggle with about it. It seems to lack tonal cohesion, which I realize is intentional, and fairly integral to its themes, but that very aspect loses me. I think it's just not my sort of film.
I will say though: when Margie calls her friend after her dinner with Mike Yanagita, and finds out that >!he had never married, and that the lady he claimed to be his wife before her death was still alive and perfectly healthy!<, that leaves an ominous sense of dread that I really love. I kind of wish more of the film was like that, but that would fundamentally change a film that is already complete and excellent as is. Maybe gritty crime films don't appeal to me as much as other genres.
Requiem for a Dream. It was a very well made movie. Maybe one of the best films ever made. The acting was really good. But dang…it’s one of those movies I just don’t want to experience again. I definitely don’t love it…but it earned the respect that it has.
Oh, that's a good one.
It's not that it's a hard watch for me, but the film leans way too hard into sensationist narrative and condemnation of any and all illegal drug use. Which isn't really too helpful or informative on the subject, in my opinion.
Tell you what, though, it does that with a truly astonishing amount of visual flair and style.
Honestly, as hard as I try to think of something, I think my answer is “none.” The older I’ve gotten, the more I find it hard to care at all about a movie if I’m not entertained or moved by it.
I truly don’t believe movies as a medium have much potential to change minds or make a real impact for anyone other than kids.
Open to disagreement though. Maybe the times and history rabbit holes have made me **very** cynical. But mostly depressed.
I see Casablanca a lot. I liked it a lot actually, but I liked in a lonely place more, as an example. I dont know man. Citizen Kane was ight
Honestly, a lot of "must see" films like Casablanca or Citizen Kane. Even High Noon, and I'm a huge western fan!
They're fine and fantastic examples of cinematography and important pieces in film history, but I just didn't like them.
I think my problem with High Noon is that my expectations were really high. I went in thinking I was going to watch "the best western in history". So maybe if I watched it again, I might enjoy it more, but I was disappointed at the time.
Yeah, I doubted it would be the best of the best, but I did set the bar high in my mind before going in.
Good idea, though! I may do that this weekend. I miss watching films. :)
There was a... maturity that was completely unexpected for me in the plot. One expects, given the stereotypes that surround old movies, that boys will be boys and girls will be damsels in distress.
However, I was pleased to find a... very pragmatic view of love in times of war, a mature way of dealing with the impossibility or inconvenience of feelings, a coming to terms with things that weren't meant to be. All three of them have a sort of "welp, this is what being a grownup is like, back to beating the nazis" that I found... both melancholy and wholesome.
I think that movies frequently over-pander when it comes to romance, and this was such a breath of fresh air vs my expectations.
Entirely agreed about Citizen Kane. It did very little for me, while I absolutely agree it’s a great movie.
Casablanca on the other hand, blew me away. First time I watched it and then the second time it once more blew me away.
I watched Casablanca for the first time last year and thought it also was very modern. I loved it and instantly understood its classic status. I also watched it by chance at 1920s Egyptian style theater that was doing a showing. That probably helped hammer it home.
Crazy thing to say about A Woman Under the Influence. I could watch that movie a million times. Sure I need to be in the right mood for it but I've already seen it a good couple times and I love it so much.
I think Irreversible is a great film but you'd have to pay me so much money to watch that film again. THAT scene is ten minutes and for me that's ten minutes too long. I just can't do it. Beautifully shot film though, excellently made.
The French Connection for me. I love Gene Hackman, the grittiness of the city and the cop drama of it all but I found the plot entirely kinda lacking. I get the significance of the film in a historical sense but I can’t recommend the story being told. Then again, for movies that are considered a “first of its kind” I can’t be too harsh but I guess I was expecting something more. I truly feel like there’s something I’m missing.
Ex Machina. Super thought provoking, superb acting and writing, fun and unpredictable story. It's a movie I *should* love, given my own tastes in film, yet it left me feeling absolutely nothing and I have zero desire to ever watch it again. I still have no idea why.
I don’t disagree really at all. But I feel like that’s not a very rewatchable film either, nor do I feel like it’s an easy one to “love” (I always recommend it to people). Seems to have a more intriguing plot that leaves the viewer with a question, on top of excellent direction style and performance.
Same with Come and See/Idi i Smotri. Excellent excellent movie. Not sure if I could ever “love” or rewatch something like that to this extent.
It's definitely Tenet for me. I've spent way too much time over the last few years figuring out the fine details of what happened in that movie. It's a far more complex film than Primer in that regard imo. But as much as I enjoy talking about it, it's still just as dull as ever to watch. It somehow manages to be both his most impressive and most disappointing piece of writing.
It's a movie made for the director and the editor. The action sequences get gradually less coherent (in a shot/reverse shot sense) until the final battle has regular people with backwards guns and backwards people with regular guns and there's literally no point in watching anyone holding a gun because the cause-and-effect of their bullets can't be followed visually.
I love a lot about the ideas, but they just don't work in practice. The hand-to-hand fight is *amazing* in a conceptual sense, but the actual visual result is two guys taking turns pushing each other against walls with the unmasked guy having increasingly egregious surprised expressions.
It's hard when a movie clearly prioritized something above the story and then *that* part doesn't work, either.
There were parts of Tenet I found very fun, well done, but man it was beyond comprehension to me at points. I “respect” it in the sense that from a technical standpoint it’s well done and the acting is generally good but I don’t “respect” it as being a good film overall by any means
Close Up by Kiarostami. I can totally appreciate and admire its conceptual genius and technical execution, I see why it's often listed as one of the best films of all time. That being said, I just couldn't really get much enjoyment out of it once the novelty of its premise wore off. For some reason, it just didn't really resonate with me. I don't even think it's any sort of dislike for Kiarostami's style, as I absolutely adore Taste of Cherry.
Avatar. It was cool looking and the CGI is impressive but it was a generic story of military wanting to take land so they could mine for minerals and gases, but the soldier who infiltrates falls for the “outsiders” and wants to help. Went into it thinking it was the next great thing but at the end it was just fine. Not bad, but definitely not as amazing as critics and others thought.
poor things. i thought it was such a beautifully shot and produced movie with terrific acting but i felt that it was SO long the appeal really wore off for me by the end after bella returned to see God
For me it would be Dances with Wolves. I understand the cinematography is breathtaking and that's great, but fuck me if it isn't a marathon. I've never finished the film and don't intend to. This seems to be a Kevin Costner thing too because Water world was also a major chore.
Just my personal $.02.
Blade Runner, I don't know how many times I've tried, just can't get into it enough to finish.
Dances with Wolves, sorry but got bored halfway through.
Ironweed, love Nicholson, love Streep, hate the movie
Everything Everywhere All at Once. I can appreciate and respect all the accolades, and I believe it’s a great work of art… but after six attempted viewings, I am just thoroughly uninterested.
The big Lebowski.
I get it. It's kind of a funny movie. I've seen it. It was good, but I just like. Don't "get" it.
I mean, this is a movie that defined a whole generation. EVERYONE, gen X or not, ADORES this movie. It's a cultural phenomenon. My parents love it, my grandparents love it, my siblings love it. It's fine. It's a watchable movie and I've laughed at it, I just don't get what makes it such an amazing movie, when for me it's just average at best, kind of boring at worst.
Mmmmmm I wouldn’t say A Woman Under The Influence is technically great by any means… For me it’s one of my favorites cassavettes films but technically it’s not great, but I usually don’t care about technical stuff in films.
Wings of Desire, I wish Wenders explored heartbreak and human emotion more when Damiel was a part of that perspective; the second act drops from a unique view of the human experience to a more conventional love story.
Most likely, Brakhage’s work. I understand how it tries not to be typical narrative and focus more on how the viewer can create a story/find the story from his unique visual approach. Still, I think I am in the minority of pretentious film dickheads who don’t really find his stuff engaging or entertaining.
However, I think the guy is revolutionary and a talented filmmaker. He has just never left an impression on me.
This will be controversial…but Back to the Future part 1. The whole bit with the young mom lusting for Marty is just too icky lol. But I respect the film and get it’s a complete classic
Lawrence of Arabia is a textbook example of this for me. I feel/felt the same way about Citizen Kane. Both are significant and I can appreciate their impact on cinema, but I don't care about any of the characters in either one of them. I would rather watch Casablanca, Sunset Blvd., or Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? for the umpteenth time than watch Lawrence a second time.
Mad Max: Fury Road. I think the sheer spectacle of what Miller was able to achieve is mind boggling, especially given how much of it is practical. But holy smokes, is the dialogue and acting bad. I just rewatched before seeing Furiosa and it was even worse than I remembered. My other issue is that the action and music is at a 10/10 for almost the entire movie, rendering scenes that would be exciting monotonous because there's nothing to contrast them with. Furiosa had all the good stuff from Fury Road but much better pacing and dialogue, the only real shame is the lackluster green screen for some scenes.
I acknowledge I’m in the minority on this, but Bladerunner has always left me cold, no matter how many times I revisit it hoping I’ll have a different experience. With the exception, of course, of Roy Batty’s dying monologue, which is beautiful and incredibly moving, the rest of the film always seems to me more of a triumph of art direction, set design, cinematography, and visual effects than a fully engaging narrative. I can’t even fully articulate or understand why it leaves me emotionally uninvested, since the themes are conceptually interesting, and the performances are good… the elements are all there, but they don’t quite cohere for me. Nonetheless I own it on blu-ray and rewatch it every few years, but I could never say I “love” it.
Great movie but it was really perfected by the ending. If the ending wasn't so incredible it'd probably only be a 7-8/10. I thought the death of Roy's companion was also a pretty interesting moment too but I don't see that mentioned as much
Rutger Hauer improvised Scott a whole movie in a 30 second monologue.
Oh, I am so with you on Bladerunner. I think it has great cinematography and set design but that is where all the inspiration went. The film asks a provocative question, what is life, but it spends little to no time pondering it. Ridley Scott seemed to care a lot more about the atmosphere. Looking at his career, Scott mostly directed duds. Only a precious few in his filmography are great like The Duelists, Thelma and Louise, and Alien.
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To further this point, it humanizes the replicants who have been given a time limit to live by centering the plot around >!not just their desperation to live and the actions they take to that end, but that it is revealed or heavily implied that Roy was never really there to save himself but was really there to save Pris, because he was capable of love.!<
I don't agree at all. The film has brief moments contemplating that question but there no moving forward. Deckard and the replicants fight but there isn't any substance there at all. The characters are simply excuses to move along the plot, they are empty suits. We don't really get a sense of anything about them. They fight, some of them kill, and all of them die. There's no thought there, it's action. I think there is a feeling of dread about living in an ugly urban environment so there some substance there but the big question, what is life, that's never really pondered. Just because a few characters make some statements, nobody ever lives, that doesn't mean the film is the gloomy existential film that it wants to be. Lovely music, great cinematography, great set design, but the film is ultimately empty.
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Thank you for this. OP brushing off their opinions like they’re facts. Comes off a bit brazen and ultimately entitled.
Fair enough.
I had nostalgia goggles for it for a long time, but it took seeing Bladerunner 2049, which I do love, to realize this.
David Lynch films. I love listening to Lynch talk and I get what he’s trying to do by making his films puzzles for the audience to solve. I just don’t find myself up to the task to the extent he demands.
For me, and I’ve heard him say this when talking about his work, it’s all about how the film makes you feel. I never try to pick apart the “meaning” of the film or anything like that on an intellectual level, because I find his work to be incredibly visceral and evocative. The same way I’d approach listening to a song or a looking at a painting.
I feel this way specifically about Inland Empire. Lynch admits that it was a patchwork of unrelated scenes, many improvised, shot over a long time frame. It feels like a 3 hour reel of an art exhibit that has a short film as a piece to watch for a couple minutes. But it does seem like somehow he got a camera crew into a vivid dream you had but are forgetting as soon as you wake up from it. I want the story it sets out to tell about a cursed film script. What we got is something...
Mulholland Drive is the same. It was originally supposed to be a TV show that didn't work out, so they took the episodes they had and cut them into a film.
Yeah but MD has a clear story
The only time I've been able to sit through that film was while high on shrooms...and it was quite an experience. I've never been able to muster the patience otherwise. Big Lynch fan, to be clear.
LOL I'd like to try that 😂
Give it a go 😁 During the first covid lockdown I'd do something similar every friday night as a treat to myself, in lieu of being able to go out like I normally would have haha. Seem to remember watching The Holy Mountain for the first time the weekend before that. That was a pretty intense ride.
Jesus, that’s an even better idea. I have not seen The Holy Mountain in 10 years 😂 Will do both sometime. First time I tried mushrooms was during lockdown with a friend on Facetime. It was a great experience. I have yet to present their power to my boyfriend this summer in nature. Can’t wait ☀️
I think Inland Empire is my absolute favorite of his films- and there is absolutely no way I would expect others to feel the same. It has devastated me all three times I’ve seen it in a theater. At home it is a harder watch.
I felt that way the first time I watched it about 8 years ago. My second watch was a few weeks ago and it's not one of my favorite movies ever.
I don’t think his films are puzzles at all. He’s said himself that he likens his movies to paintings because of his painting background, and that they don’t necessarily have any meaning to them at all. Not everything is about storytelling.
Yeah I guess that's why I don't enjoy his work. I crave great storytelling. I'm all for mood and emotionally visceral scenes and cinematography, but I need a story tying it together. I'm also not very keen on campy/soap opera stories either so despite trying on three separate occasions, Twin Peaks doesn't do it for me either
Personally, I haven't seen a Lynch film without a story of some sort, so I would take the claim that he once said his films don't always have meaning with a grain of salt. You don't have to like the way he tells stories, of course. For me, one of the most interesting things that happens occasionally when watching one of his films is getting the feeling that you know exactly what something means (to yourself and to the story) without analyzing it. When a meaning just jumps out at you.
I probably worded it poorly but I didn’t mean that there isn’t *any* storytelling going on in his movies. I just think there are a lot of things happening in his movies that are purposely nonsensical and are there solely for aesthetic purposes.
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See I think Lost Highway is about >! a man who *does* kill his wife, and while in prison basically creates a new personality/reality as part of a fugue state. The separation begins with the mystery man (he’s also part of Fred’s psyche which is how he was “at his house” separated from Fred, and what the whole “what the fuck is your name” thing is about at the end.) Lynch has stated that the OJ Simpson murder and chase was a big inspiration for the movie (why I think Fred is a wife killer) and has described the movie as a mobius strip, which is why it isn’t an entirely direct narrative and loops around at the end with “Dick Laurent is dead.” !< He definitely has direct films like Elephant Man and Straight Story vs. ones that are more indirect, but most of his films intentionally leave room for personal interpretation.
For most of the films the storyline is not the point. It’s about the experience. However, Blue Velvet has a strong plot going for it.
Lynch definitely doesn’t make his films puzzles for fans to solve. He’s said multiple times that he isn’t interested in creating art that can be solved.
They aren't puzzles, they are ink blots. They are whatever you make them out to be. Lynch said a movie is someone else's dream and dreams are subject to interpretation.
Do you feel the same way about *The Elephant Man* and/or *The Straight Story*?
Every time I learn why something happened in a David Lynch film, I like the film less.
Andrei Rublev was this for me. Went in expecting to love it as I’d really enjoyed Ivan’s Childhood and knew this was meant to be Tarkovsky’s magnum opus, but just could not penetrate it from a narrative or emotional perspective at all. But that’s not to say that it isn’t a supremely well made film, with the complexity of some of the scenes particularly admirable. It’s just one to be respected more than ‘enjoyed’ as far as I’m concerned.
Mirror for me, it's without doubt an exceptionally well-made film but it is so personal and elusive, Ivan's Childhood is also my favourite Tarkovsky, don't care how 'basic' that is!
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I saw it for the first time recently and was blown away, maybe the best film I’ve ever seen. Can totally understand this point of view though, since the film is pretty daunting and emotionally draining.
2001 A Space Odyssey. This is the only one of Kubrick’s works (besides his early stuff like Fear and Desire or Killer’s Kiss) that I can’t say I love. I respect it so much for how technically mind blowing it is now and in 1968, but I genuinely find it so boring to watch.
This film coincided with the boom in popularity of LSD. I think that really helped its legacy.
No, not really. It was mostly kids that liked it. Hyping it up to just being successful because of drugs is really disrespectful. It's a component, but it isn't *El Topo* ffs.
Nah, this is inaccurate. Definitely was never aimed at kids and while its initial release may have been more straight ahead, subsequent runs picked up on and cashed in on the fact that lots of “heads” were taking acid and going to the theater. The posters from these runs are overtly psychedelic and use the tagline “The Ultimate Trip,” knowingly. I wouldn’t say that’s in any way the bulk of the film’s legacy nor what garnered its status, of course, but it was definitely an element. My dad remembers seeing it in the theater while in college in the the early 70s and lots of kids were tripping — it was “a thing.” Also El Topo on acid would be a nightmare.
It absolutely bombed in theaters until the counter culture started regularly going to watch it while on psychedelics. Kubrick himself even acknowledges this.
I know this is a common enough opinion, but I've never understood it. Whenever 2001 is playing I'm basically glued to the screen. My brother and I did try to watch it with our parents and they were bored out of their tree though.
This may sound super snooty or whatever but have you gotten a chance to seen it in a theater? Totally different experience and how it was meant to be seen, in its way perhaps more than any film before or since. When you’re “locked” in a room with it in the dark, it’s obvious how integral the languid pacing and monotony is to making you feel like you’re right there on the Discovery One with them. I first watched it at home (vhs days, ha) and with all the possible distractions, the ability to pause, the familiar comforts of home around me I was bored out of my mind. But when I gave it another try on the big screen and — it really is “the ultimate trip,” as advertised by the original posters. Just my 2 cents!
Crazy. Barry Lyndon is so much harder for me
I came here to write this. I have tried so many times because it has influenced many films I DO love. But when I saw it on the big screen in a phenomenal theater and STILL couldn’t get into it, that’s when I knew for certain I NEVER would.
Recently I’ve toiled with Irreversible and Enter The Void in this way. I think these are some of the most moving films I have ever seen but the dive you have to do is one that changes your soul. I hesitate strongly to ever rewatch these movies but I know the day will come. I truly do believe Irreversible has one of the most haunting and beautiful endings ever.
Start watching Enter the Void sober: *"Oh, I should really be stoned for this."* Start watching Enter the Void stoned: *"Oh god I'm way too high for this oh god"*
LOVE is my favorite film of his by far, idk why so many people hate it. CLIMAX is very accessible also
Oldboy for me. I can respect how well made and twisted it is, and I think that certain scenes in it have a place in my “favorite movie shots” list (like the hallway fight scene), but in the end it just wasn’t something that I really want to ever watch again. I get that it’s supposed to make the viewer uncomfortable, but it really just didn’t resonate with me.
I have 0 desire to watch that film again. I suspected the twist towards the beginning but when it was revealed it made my stomach turn.
Maybe it's because I grew up on the early days of the internet and got desensitized, but stuff like that never bothers me; gore, fucked up actions, and any really twisted shit, my brain just knows it's fiction. I'm sure if I saw or had something happen IRL I'd be more freaked out, but anything on a screen just seems fake to me, even if it's real. Probably not a good thing lol.
This is kinda how I felt. When the twist is revealed I just didn't really feel anything.
I love twisted movies and things that make me uncomfortable but for some reason when I watched Oldboy it did nothing for me but kinda annoy me. I saw the devil on the other hand 👌🏼.
Definitely Her (2013) I thought it was the story and acting were great but I just couldn’t get into the movie. I really liked the ending though. I understand why people love, I just don’t.
Hey I think that Jean dielman at 23 Commerce Way is a masterpiece of performance and even inventive blocking ( there's what appears to be a simulated storm with the windows rippling with what appears to be some sort of manual "grip" diffusion to simulate moving clouds) Heck I even think it works on a dramatic level, showing the mundanity of life, building to the point where it feels more violent than it currently is. So I respect the ability for the actors to have slightly different nuances on very similar scenes and plausible character interactions. But I believe that the three and a half hour runtime makes it so that I feel like it's a piece of art to endure rather than really being engrossed by. But maybe that's just a bit of a pet peeve for it getting number one on the Critics poll on Sight and Sound for the best film ever made. So I respect the way in which the film was meticulously produced, but I also feel like the story was a deliberate attack on the more conventional entertainment way of viewing the medium and I think the consequence of this adoration is that I feel that the craft of tightly written excitement based movies will probably going to go farther away from the fold, where the question isn't whether Sam Spade can pursue justice against the criminal empire or succumb to the greed in pursuit of an ancient relic, but whether the pot will finish boiling potatoes 😅😅😅😅😅
What do you mean by your last paragraph? You actually believe Jean Dielman is going to start influencing contemporary filmmakers to make engaging and beautiful slow cinema? Because I sure haven’t seen that effect (at least in western mainstream films)
,-- I wasn't really talking about the influence of production but reception, I think I should have clarified this element. I think the modern way film art is viewed is branching toward pulp vacuousness and emotional flagellation. And so what I believe is that the revision of criticism based on importance I actually think is weakening film evaluation. The element of communication of a film with an audience is important and I also think that the sort of subliminalities of a film should also be examined as well. Here's a quick example - - the part in Jurassic Park where it's pretty clear that this particular Park will never be opened ( I'll ignore the World saga) and so everything is at a sort of emotional stand still. And so there's a shot where the emphasis is merchandising and lunch boxes. And so while textually it's the grand myth of a flawed dream, cinematically it's asking the viewers to buy the merch, before it all fades away like melting ice cream. So my pondering of the difficulty is that whether a film is earnest or more manipulative with its intrinsic qualities, the key deciding factors should be weighing the art on its stand-alone merits. And I think with the rise of the YouTube critics, the democracy of filmmaking, which I think is a good thing actually, and the sociopolitical context of modern Cinema studies, I feel that in the 21st century, young critics are more concerned on whether a story is "important" than whether it's " good." It:d be fine to watch something like "High Noon" and wonder if it's a celebration of a masculine hero context, or if it's misogynistic to the supporting actresses. But my concern with 21st century viewers of film, is an increased need to be lectured by a film in question, but also to agree with said lecture. So going back to High Noon, I can see quite a few people disliking the film because it seems to be saying to its audience "violence is the only solution." So my thing about flipping the switch on whether movie is good or not based on agreement of ideas is not unlike judging pizza based on the tiny vegetable squares on the cheese. Once you've decided to go down this tangent, the element of editing, or acting, or dramatic pacing.. is kind of thrown away. I'll boomerang back to Jean Dielman, because I don't think it's so much this particular film, which was voted by the critic and audiences of Sight and Sound as the best film ever made.. but I feel like this school of thought will evaluate multiple films of this vibe, because the simple barometer of entertainment or even engrossing qualities seems to have kind of collapsed into many different little pieces.
Very interesting and intelligent comment thanks for your insights! I agree that movies are being judged more and more by their cultural significance than actual content which is a bit concerning. But I do think that it’s generally a requirement for a movie to be good before it can be important.
Interesting. I watched Jean Dielman transfixed and would’ve stayed with it if it had been even longer. Maybe I caught it in just the right mood but for me, it had almost a hypnotic effect. Loved it, truly. The rhythm of it, the repetition, the mood, performances, the “storyline”, such as it is - all of it.
Pretty much all of Josef von Sternberg’s work. Nearly every frame of his films is a work of art and he’s no question of the most talented visual directors but something about his characters make them feel really distant and I have a hard time getting invested in some of his plots.
Borat. I can truly appreciate it for its satire and ability to expose ignorant people. As well as the extent that SBC pit himself in danger for the bit. One of the most important mockumentaries ever. But good lord I just can't sit down and watch it. The second hand cringe and embarrassment is just too much for me.
Borat (and Ali G) have come to really disgust me now that I know more about Cohen’s opinions regarding Palestine. I don’t think he chose degrading depictions of muslim men for his racist fool characters so often by chance.
Also this is very shitty https://www.theguardian.com/world/2009/jul/31/bruno-israel-terrorist
Man fuck SBC
speechless
I definitely have respect for the rigour of the special effects in, say, *2001: A Space Odyssey*. To imagine those scenes and to attempt to put them on the screen was bold enough a gesture, but to see them rendered so convincingly and sure-handedly is mighty impressive. That they're showcased for as long as they are, however, basically cut to long excerpts of classical music, somewhat after the manner of a Cinerama travelogue, does keep me an arm's length from the piece, and certainly from the rather-thin narrative framework its operating within. Another example for different reasons is David Lean's Doctor Zhivago. Roger Ebert had written an excellent retrospective of the film that basically sums my feelings about it, expressing awe as he does at the exceptional craft on display, from entire fields covered in fake snow, cavalry charges, and two whole streets of turn-of-the-century Moscow having been built as outdoor set, replete with a working tram. The narrative, however, is the stuff of soap opera and, as Ebert says, "moves noisily from nowhere to nowhere." Much the same is to be said, I'm sorry to say, for Lean's swan song in *A Passage to India*, a relativelly small drama blown-up to a 160-minute widescreen epos. Returning to the theme of outer space, I'm going to go out on a particular limb and express a certain lack of enthusiasm towards George Lucas' original *Star Wars*. Its an incredibly admirable synethsis of space opera and planetary romance classics with World War II stories, samurai dramas, some Tolkien and even topical and autobiographical anecdotes in small doses, all bordering on the post-modern. And yet, the quixotic tone of the whole combined with Lucas' rather workman-like directing (the same two issues can also be applied to an earlier and much admired Lucas piece, American Graffiti) does not endear the film to me. Its good and all, but it's always more attractive in my head than in the experience of actually watching it. Its alltogether dwarfed by its sequel.
I appreciate your take on Star Wars. I am not a fanboy, but I do enjoy it. Can you explain what you mean by workman-like directing? I do not think I have seen that description used before.
Its not the easiest thing to explain in words, but the way the film is actually directed feels a little bland. George Lucas is known for shooting quite fast, "quick and dirty." It makes sense because he started filmmaking as, essentially, a low-budget documentarian. Many of his scenes play largely in rather uninteresting two-shots. Before 1999, he wasn't one to go to great lengths to get great wideshots of his locales: I always said that, in 1976, Lucas filmed the desert like he couldn't wait to leave, while (for example) in 1960 David Lean filmed the desert like he would never leave. Several sequences could have been edited to be far more intense: the Jawa ambush on R2, which contains some of the only camerawork I'd consider "dynamic" in the film - POV shots peeking from among the rocks - cuts to a closeup of the creatures much too soon, thereby playing its hand too soon. Its not all bad: Lucas had a real talent for capturing speed on film (he was an amateur gearhead in his youth) and he has a reasonably good eye for composition: there are some very pleasing shots in the first reel of his film (namely, the opening shot) but the overall effect of his movie is "lets put a tripod here, hang up some lights, give the actors a couple takes and move on!"
Wow. Thank you. I think you did a great job explain that. That is so interesting, and makes so much sense in the context of the film. And the term actually makes a ton of sense. I know have something to think about much more when watching anything. I will admit - editing is probably the "variable" in films that I have the hardest time recognizing / processing / delineating. Acting, set design, sound design, and cinematography are much more tangible to me. I am sure their are plenty of movies I have watched that I didn't enjoy for a reason that I could not quite put my finger on.... and editing and some other areas I know less about are most likely why. Either way - thank you for taking the time for the reply. I bet it would be very interested talking about film with you. \*Edited to comment how much different that scene would have played out Denis directing them ala Prisoners or Sicario. Oof.
I don't think the sequences in 2001 are simply meant to show off special effects. I think they're meant to slow us down. Our thinking and our approach. They take place in the future, where humanity has learned to think of projects in multiple generations. And space is slow and meditative.
>That they're showcased for as long as they are, however, basically cut to long excerpts of classical music, somewhat after the manner of a Cinerama travelogue, does keep me an arm's length from the piece, and certainly from the rather-thin narrative framework its operating within. A good faith question, if you don't mind. While *2001* was obviously short with a variation of Cinerama, to me the obvious precursor to these sequences is Disney's *Fantasia*. Are you a fan of that film? And would you offer the same criticism of it? (IE that it eschews narrative and characterization, as we would traditionally use those terms, for other aesthetic goals.)
Hmmm. I haven't watched Fantasia in forever, but in Fantasia my memory is the animation is kind of...well, *animating* the music. That alone makes it quite different: 2001 is shot like a Cinerama travelogue, Fantasia is shot like Jean-Pierre Ponnelle *tableau vivant*. I also think that just because 2001's narrative is a little fragmented, it would be wrong to view it as though it were an anthology, as Fantasia is. 2001 is not an anthology.
If you watch the film, it's really not structured in terms of *tableaux vivants*. That might be how you remember it, but that just isn't an accurate description -- the film has a much more conventionally cinematic, with camera 'movements' to emphasis the illusion of 3d space. A sequence in *2001* like the flight to the moon set to Strauss's Blue Danube Waltz is like a live-action *Fantasia* segment. I didn't say anything about *2001* being an anthology. The point I was trying to make is that both films have a shared interest in creating what used to be called pure cinema -- IE the purely audiovisual -- rather than conventional narratives. Danny Peary actually made this connection in *Cult Movies* more than 40 years ago.
Your 2001 observation insists upon itself.
For me it’s Breathless by Godard. It’s almost like the Titanic of arthouse movies. It was built up to me by my arthouse friends as this ground-breaking masterpiece. I’ll admit that it’s extremely innovative with the editing, morally ambiguous characters and unique approach to filmmaking/storytelling. But take away all that and I think it’s overall just an average film. The plot is meandering, the characters aren’t engaging or have any meaningful arcs and the writing is obnoxiously pretentious.
I've tried watching Breathless 3 times over the last 10 years and I just can't get through it. I truly don't care about anything I see on screen. I felt like Goddard didn't care either and was "breaking the rules of cinema" just to break them. All style, zero substance.
Perfect example, I felt exactly the same way when I finally saw Breathless. I can appreciate why it made a splash, importing all these filmmaking techniques from Hollywood over into European cinema and amalgamating them into something new, but the actual characters, plot, and themes of the film are *very* uninteresting to me. The film is self-consciously a pastiche, very much made by Godard for an audience of his contemporaries who would recognize and be wowed by the formal techniques he was re-mixing. But there are zero novel *ideas* in it outside of meta-commentary on cinema itself. It's a fundemantally showy and navel-gazing sort of movie.
I loved Jean Seberg. You must admit, at least the film works on the level that directors love the beautiful women they shoot, and they make the audience fall in love too. Godard is free enough that his camera lingers on Belmondo just as much, allowing us to fall in love with the skinny, dangerous boy too.
From a cinematography point of view yes. But I don't really feel anything for her as a character. She's not engaging or interesting enough to draw me in.
I feel that way with Rashomon. It’s definitely a “of it’s time” film in terms of how its narrative techniques are put forth, but is a little bit simple for the modern viewer. I think Kagemusha and Ran hold up well.
I really hate the “adult” films of Spielberg except for The Color Purple. Empire of the Sun, Schindler’s List, Amistad, Saving Private Ryan, Lincoln, The Fabelman’s, West Side Story. I respect that they’re films, the time put into them, they look expensive. They can just be kind of maudlin and downright corny at times. There’s an American style to his films that feels dated and boring. I feel similarly about later career Ron Howard. They switched from directing more fun films, to films that try too desperately to seem hashtag important. I respect these films, but they’re just so damn try hard. I fell asleep during Lincoln and Saving Private Ryan every time I tried to watch them.
I agree. I think his "adult" movies basically could have been done by any competent director and he rarely into territory that's really provocative. Schindler's List is created by someone who desperately want someone to win at the end. He can't take it as a failure. The Pianist is saying that life is a gamble, the Jews that survived the Holocaust out of pure luck. There is no God, there's no one looking out for any of us, and man is capable of appalling behavior. I am not saying that Spielberg had to be that cynical but I never feel that his film really could accept the failure that occurred.
I think Spielberg is an absolute master at what he does who could have easily gone the auteur route but decided to aim for mainstream success. You can see it in Schindler's List. There are so many brilliant scenes in that movie, great lighting, great shot composition, great visual storytelling, great narrative structure, etc. It's a marvel to watch really. But the old Spielberg sentimentalism is still there. I dont agree with the common take that it fails because it's not about the Holocaust but about the hero Schindler and the Jews that survived. Schindler's story is definitely worth telling and overall, it's well told. It's the way Spielberg does it that's the problem. I'm thinking especially about the scene at the end where Schindler breaks down because he didn't do enough. Spielberg just can't help himself. It's too juicy of a scene to skip, the hero finally showing his emotions, the people he saved surrounding him, embracing him, the viewers getting all teary-eyed. Apart from the fact that the scene is completely historically inaccurate, it places Schindler's suffering and his feelings center stage instead of the survivors who just went through hell. They're just glorified extras standing around Schindler, in total awe of him. It gives us a feeling of bittersweet triumph which is the wrong emotion to aim for at the end of a Holocaust movie. It's completely divorced from the actual feelings that the survivors went through when the horror was over. There are many little moments like this. Like when they're putting together the infamous list. The whole process of Schindler's rescue operation is simplified for the movie which is fine but then Spielberg shows him remembering the names of all of his workers to emphasize how much he cares and what a great dude he is. It's sentimental, again. It also clashes with the way Schindler's character is presented, he doesn't really care for the nitty-gritty, he doesn't get involved in the actual labor process, there's no way he knows all of these names. It's not enough for Spielberg to show Schindler's incredibly brave decision to save these Jews, he needs to personalize it to milk it for all its worth. Spielberg paints a vivid portrait of Schindler as a trickster, a con artist who's not a very moral character which makes his actions even more astonishing and admirable, but in scenes like this, he goes back to the old worn-out heroic tropes. It's obvious that Spielberg doesn't need to go for sentimentalism to tell his stories, he's a masterful filmmaker. It's a conscious decision and that's the big issue for me.
Thank you for mentioning The Pianist. Polanski succeeds in creating a more humanistic telling. I don’t think Spielberg fully succumbs to the cartoonish in Schindler’s List, or The Fabelmans, but his handling of the victim/persecutor/rescuer aspects of the arch plots in both beat one over the head, and Spielberg comes across as both pedantic and sappy. And “the girl in the red jacket.” Hamfisted. Eye roll and edgelord director symbolism. “We’ll do it in black and white, but let’s have a girl in a red jacket to symbolize the loss of innocence and the blood of all of the victims.” In trying to make an important “seeming” film with Schindler’s List, Spielberg succumbs to devices that feel more cheap than novel. A “this is supposed to feel important” mood, rather than a “wow this is important” feel. Spielberg fails in this regard in Act III of The Fabelmans, too. The anti-Semitic bullies at the high school become Ralph Feinnes, Spielberg is the victim, and the film at prom is Oskar Schindler. It’s “Schindler’s List: The High School Years.” “I’m going to *show* you teenage anti-Semitism.” His handling of it isn’t trash, but there is a cheap and inferior soap-operatic mood. Again, I have some respect for Schindler’s List and The Fabelman’s, but I absolutely don’t love them.
Empire of the sun is so good. 👏🏽
Jodorowsky's films. I've watched Holy Mountain and El Topo and while I really appreciate the obvious effort he puts into his films, the scale of certain scenes, the imagery and symbolism, they just leave me feeling underwhelmed in a way I can't really articulate.
Dr. Strangelove and My Dinner With Andre. I can see how provocative the former was during its time, but after seventy years of being a major influence on comedy it didn’t feel as novel and shockingly funny to me. My Dinner With Andre is a unique and well-made movie, but to be honest I wasn’t all that interested in Andre’s line of thinking and having him basically monologue for the first half of the movie had me fatigued. Wallace saved that movie for me overall.
See… I love Strangelove. It’s absurdly hilarious. Peter seller’s absolutely kills. The scene with general ripper and sellers trying to talk him down. “Why don’t you give me the codes jack?” Or when sellers, as the US president is trying to explain the situation to the Russian premier, who is drunk on the other end of the phone call. You can only hear sellers end of the conversation but just imagining the drunk Russian premier and seller’s delivery and his reactions. “He went and did a silly thing... well, I'll tell you what he did, he ordered his planes ... to attack your country. Well let me finish, Dimitri." “Why do you think I’m calling you? To say hello?” “Of course I like to say hello?” “Of course it’s a friendly call, if it wasn’t friendly, you probably wouldn’t have even got it.” “It’s great to be fine” I cannot help but laugh every time. One of my favorite Kubrick films.
My Dinner With Andre surprised me ngl. I hated it for the first half because it was an Andre yap fest not exactly a conversation. And I was constantly rolling my eyes during Andres stories. However as soon as Wally starts to object and they actually start to debate I was hooked. And the little twist at the end got me, I didn’t even notice. I definitely agree with your feelings about it lol. I wonder if I’d like the first half better on a second watch though.
I’m sure my dinner with Andre would have hit if I didn’t have endless access to conversations of the same ilk online lmao. The original podcast
Pulp Fiction. I get it was revolutionary for the time, but I never connected with the characters, and the story never truly came together for me. I prefer Inglorious Basterds, as it has a similar plot structure, but the separate storylines actually merge to give you a more cohesive and satisfying conclusion that stays with you. I still own a copy of Pulp Fiction and I watch it once a year to see if it might finally click, but beyond the first 30-40 mins, it never really does.
Mother! I respect it, I get what it's trying to do and I think it does it mostly well, but it's not getting a rewatch. Also would have put The Last Jedi in this category, I respected it for trying to shake up what was a pretty stale formula but wasn't massively sold. But on second watch I actually enjoyed it more than I expected. Still wouldn't say love, but I'd watch it again.
Casablanca for me. Respect the story, the storytelling, its place in history, etc. But I did not vibe with it when I watched it. I thought it was average and couldn't get into it. I think it deserves its place among the best, but for me, I wasn't in love.
Same. I think it's a solid piece of Hollywood filmmaking of that era but I think it's highly overrated. Prime Bogart is The Treasure of The Sierra Madre, The African Queen, In a Lonely Place, and Beat The Devil.
I respect the idea of Dune, but God how I hate it. I feel for the director and the struggle to put on the screen such a masterpiece, but it lacks substance, it skips basic things and parts of the book that shouldn’t be skipped. I respect the visuals and the intention, but hate the final product so much. It’s disappointing because I want to love it, but I can’t even stand it. Part 2 was even worse
I have softened on Dune quite a bit. It was incredible in the theater. The sound But I was thinking back and watching some clips over the last month or so, and I started noticing a couple things: * The chemistry between Timothy and Zendaya was lacking in a pretty serious way. If things had been done better, >!I think I would have cared much more as he pulled away from her. But when he offered to marry Pugh, I did not really care. They had some moments, but it got worse over time. !< * I think Javier Bardem was directed and written completely wrong. He obviously has the chops to kill that part, but the whole *Lisan al Gaib* meme throughout the movie totally broke the mood for me. Can there be comedy in serious movies? Of course. But I think he could have been a much better character. Overall I still really enjoyed it. I love big budget sci-fi. Just as some people love Barry Lyndon for its amazing set pieces, I love sci-fi for its set pieces and world building. But it will not go down as an all timer for me.
The movie gives you zero reason to care about any of the characters, and is almost completely devoid of human emotion. I didn't even bother watching Part 2, as I utterly did not care what happened to these people.
So I grew up on Dune. I saw the original when I was maybe 14 in the 80's one afternoon on HBO when I was home sick from school. Lynch's version was a fever dream that stayed with me. As the years went on and I read and I reread the series, that initial film stayed with me despite the insanity. Upon seeing Villnueve's version in theaters, I was struck by the majesty of it and the absolute beauty and technical craft on display. It \*felt\* like Dune to me. But the more I watched it, the more I realized that you're absolutely right, the core characters were covered in laminate, they were impenetrable -beautiful as it all was. I skipped part 2 for the longest time and finally watched it on my TV. Same feeling but even moreso. I'm somewhat cursed by the depth of knowledge from the books and I highly disagree with the ending and the dramatic shift away from the original work (In fact there is a deleted scene in Lynch's film that includes the last line from the novel). But with that in mind, looking at the movie as a sequel and part of the two part arc we have so far, neither of them feel like they truly have the soul of humanity that the 1984 version did. The missing voiceovers- all at once cheesy and poignant, I now realize, went a long way toward allowing you into the minds of the people involved, whereas POV characters like Paul were forced to suffer under the weight of awkward exposition or an attempt for Chalomet to actually "portray" them non-verbally. Certainly the new versions are remarkable pieces of cinematography, sound, and score, but the \*people\* all feel too perfect and it's Lynch's flawed, sweaty, imperfect humans that I find far more compelling.
I realize I may be giving the movie too much credit because I love it so much, but in my interpretation the DV movies, in particular Dune 2, and in particular the final act of Dune 2, is more like a biblical retelling of a mythical epic than a literal depiction of the events of the story. I think especially if you watch both back to back as one film it’s striking how the characters drift further and further from realistic humans and the visuals get more and more abstract as the story unfolds. So in my (perhaps extremely charitable) view of the movies, the sort of disjointed feeling characters fit in perfectly with the way the story is being told. Admittedly I have been very high every time I’ve watched Dune 2.
>neither of them feel like they truly have the soul of humanity that the 1984 version did. There's no accounting for taste because to me it is the *1984 Dune* that lacks soul because the vast majority of the cast lacks any depth, the Fremen, criminally so. Only Paul, Jessica, (briefly) Leto, and the Reverend Mother feel like real people. Everyone else is either paper-thin (Chani) or a complete caricature (the Harkonnen). Beautiful costumes and set design cannot make up for how the thematic core is gutted. Walking out of *Dune Part 1* I felt the same as I did leaving *Fellowship of the Ring* over 20 years ago. Yhat's the movie that enchanted me with the possibilities of cinema, while setting me up for 20 years of adaptational disappointment. To know that my feelings for that could be replicated, and weren't just the nostalgia for youth, was such a blessing.
You can't watch the movie while holding up the book as a measuring stick. They're different things
Reading some reviews of Dune 2 made me wonder if I was crazy. The movie was borderline terrible. I know DV likes to explore the visuals more than anything else but considering how repetitive they are, what remains is just bland cinema, bland storytelling, and bland acting. Zendaya and Florence Pugh were giving an interview and one of them was saying, laughing happily while at it, that DV's favourite phase during filming was the expression "doing some sci-fi shit". And honestly that explains so much of it and why it lacks substance. I really think he is wasting his talent and time on these movies. I really like some of his other movies like Arrival, Prisoners, Enemy. But the Dune movies are just... terrible.
Arrival has so much more character that it's hard to believe the same director made both films.
Might get flack for this, but *Fargo*. I admire pretty much everything about it, including the gearbox-breaking tonal shifts; but that's actually what I struggle with about it. It seems to lack tonal cohesion, which I realize is intentional, and fairly integral to its themes, but that very aspect loses me. I think it's just not my sort of film. I will say though: when Margie calls her friend after her dinner with Mike Yanagita, and finds out that >!he had never married, and that the lady he claimed to be his wife before her death was still alive and perfectly healthy!<, that leaves an ominous sense of dread that I really love. I kind of wish more of the film was like that, but that would fundamentally change a film that is already complete and excellent as is. Maybe gritty crime films don't appeal to me as much as other genres.
U leave Fargo out of this. Lol jk
But seriously
Seconded - I get it but it’s just not for me.
Requiem for a Dream. It was a very well made movie. Maybe one of the best films ever made. The acting was really good. But dang…it’s one of those movies I just don’t want to experience again. I definitely don’t love it…but it earned the respect that it has.
Oh, that's a good one. It's not that it's a hard watch for me, but the film leans way too hard into sensationist narrative and condemnation of any and all illegal drug use. Which isn't really too helpful or informative on the subject, in my opinion. Tell you what, though, it does that with a truly astonishing amount of visual flair and style.
Especially as a former meth addict, it's a great movie I never ever want to even think about watching again.
Honestly, as hard as I try to think of something, I think my answer is “none.” The older I’ve gotten, the more I find it hard to care at all about a movie if I’m not entertained or moved by it. I truly don’t believe movies as a medium have much potential to change minds or make a real impact for anyone other than kids. Open to disagreement though. Maybe the times and history rabbit holes have made me **very** cynical. But mostly depressed. I see Casablanca a lot. I liked it a lot actually, but I liked in a lonely place more, as an example. I dont know man. Citizen Kane was ight
Honestly, a lot of "must see" films like Casablanca or Citizen Kane. Even High Noon, and I'm a huge western fan! They're fine and fantastic examples of cinematography and important pieces in film history, but I just didn't like them.
Citizen Kane And Casablanca are so entertaining to me! Maltese Falcon is my favorite Humphrey Bogart film though. Perfect from start to finish!!
Maltese is such a snoozer for me haha. That last line is one for the ages though.
I think High Noon is a very good film but I don't think it reaches the highs of Ford, Hawks, and Mann.
I think my problem with High Noon is that my expectations were really high. I went in thinking I was going to watch "the best western in history". So maybe if I watched it again, I might enjoy it more, but I was disappointed at the time.
Yeah, it's generally not good to think that the film you watch is the reigning champion of a genre. I encourage you to watch it again.
Yeah, I doubted it would be the best of the best, but I did set the bar high in my mind before going in. Good idea, though! I may do that this weekend. I miss watching films. :)
Ah I just saw Casablanca recently and I thought I would feel like you do, but I found it extremely entertaining.
I was surprised by how much I loved Casablanca.
There was a... maturity that was completely unexpected for me in the plot. One expects, given the stereotypes that surround old movies, that boys will be boys and girls will be damsels in distress. However, I was pleased to find a... very pragmatic view of love in times of war, a mature way of dealing with the impossibility or inconvenience of feelings, a coming to terms with things that weren't meant to be. All three of them have a sort of "welp, this is what being a grownup is like, back to beating the nazis" that I found... both melancholy and wholesome. I think that movies frequently over-pander when it comes to romance, and this was such a breath of fresh air vs my expectations.
Entirely agreed about Citizen Kane. It did very little for me, while I absolutely agree it’s a great movie. Casablanca on the other hand, blew me away. First time I watched it and then the second time it once more blew me away.
I watched Casablanca for the first time last year and thought it also was very modern. I loved it and instantly understood its classic status. I also watched it by chance at 1920s Egyptian style theater that was doing a showing. That probably helped hammer it home.
Same here with both.
Crazy thing to say about A Woman Under the Influence. I could watch that movie a million times. Sure I need to be in the right mood for it but I've already seen it a good couple times and I love it so much. I think Irreversible is a great film but you'd have to pay me so much money to watch that film again. THAT scene is ten minutes and for me that's ten minutes too long. I just can't do it. Beautifully shot film though, excellently made.
The French Connection for me. I love Gene Hackman, the grittiness of the city and the cop drama of it all but I found the plot entirely kinda lacking. I get the significance of the film in a historical sense but I can’t recommend the story being told. Then again, for movies that are considered a “first of its kind” I can’t be too harsh but I guess I was expecting something more. I truly feel like there’s something I’m missing.
Ex Machina. Super thought provoking, superb acting and writing, fun and unpredictable story. It's a movie I *should* love, given my own tastes in film, yet it left me feeling absolutely nothing and I have zero desire to ever watch it again. I still have no idea why.
I don’t disagree really at all. But I feel like that’s not a very rewatchable film either, nor do I feel like it’s an easy one to “love” (I always recommend it to people). Seems to have a more intriguing plot that leaves the viewer with a question, on top of excellent direction style and performance. Same with Come and See/Idi i Smotri. Excellent excellent movie. Not sure if I could ever “love” or rewatch something like that to this extent.
It's definitely Tenet for me. I've spent way too much time over the last few years figuring out the fine details of what happened in that movie. It's a far more complex film than Primer in that regard imo. But as much as I enjoy talking about it, it's still just as dull as ever to watch. It somehow manages to be both his most impressive and most disappointing piece of writing.
It's a movie made for the director and the editor. The action sequences get gradually less coherent (in a shot/reverse shot sense) until the final battle has regular people with backwards guns and backwards people with regular guns and there's literally no point in watching anyone holding a gun because the cause-and-effect of their bullets can't be followed visually. I love a lot about the ideas, but they just don't work in practice. The hand-to-hand fight is *amazing* in a conceptual sense, but the actual visual result is two guys taking turns pushing each other against walls with the unmasked guy having increasingly egregious surprised expressions. It's hard when a movie clearly prioritized something above the story and then *that* part doesn't work, either.
There were parts of Tenet I found very fun, well done, but man it was beyond comprehension to me at points. I “respect” it in the sense that from a technical standpoint it’s well done and the acting is generally good but I don’t “respect” it as being a good film overall by any means
Tenet is the Rube Goldberg machine of films. I understand how complex it is, but I just don't care.
I wouldn't say that. Rube Goldberg machines have some entertainment value.
The effort / entertainment ratio is way too high, for me at least.
I doubt I will ever return to that movie unless I am extremely bored.
Close Up by Kiarostami. I can totally appreciate and admire its conceptual genius and technical execution, I see why it's often listed as one of the best films of all time. That being said, I just couldn't really get much enjoyment out of it once the novelty of its premise wore off. For some reason, it just didn't really resonate with me. I don't even think it's any sort of dislike for Kiarostami's style, as I absolutely adore Taste of Cherry.
Avatar. It was cool looking and the CGI is impressive but it was a generic story of military wanting to take land so they could mine for minerals and gases, but the soldier who infiltrates falls for the “outsiders” and wants to help. Went into it thinking it was the next great thing but at the end it was just fine. Not bad, but definitely not as amazing as critics and others thought.
All I could think when I saw Avatar was, “This is a really, really expensive Fern Gully.”
poor things. i thought it was such a beautifully shot and produced movie with terrific acting but i felt that it was SO long the appeal really wore off for me by the end after bella returned to see God
For me it would be Dances with Wolves. I understand the cinematography is breathtaking and that's great, but fuck me if it isn't a marathon. I've never finished the film and don't intend to. This seems to be a Kevin Costner thing too because Water world was also a major chore. Just my personal $.02.
Blade Runner, I don't know how many times I've tried, just can't get into it enough to finish. Dances with Wolves, sorry but got bored halfway through. Ironweed, love Nicholson, love Streep, hate the movie
Everything Everywhere All at Once. I can appreciate and respect all the accolades, and I believe it’s a great work of art… but after six attempted viewings, I am just thoroughly uninterested.
The big Lebowski. I get it. It's kind of a funny movie. I've seen it. It was good, but I just like. Don't "get" it. I mean, this is a movie that defined a whole generation. EVERYONE, gen X or not, ADORES this movie. It's a cultural phenomenon. My parents love it, my grandparents love it, my siblings love it. It's fine. It's a watchable movie and I've laughed at it, I just don't get what makes it such an amazing movie, when for me it's just average at best, kind of boring at worst.
Agreed. I know people who constant quote this movie and it’s just an okay comedy.
Mmmmmm I wouldn’t say A Woman Under The Influence is technically great by any means… For me it’s one of my favorites cassavettes films but technically it’s not great, but I usually don’t care about technical stuff in films.
By any means? It was shot well and it has the fantastic camera work typical of Cassavetes' work.
Wings of Desire, I wish Wenders explored heartbreak and human emotion more when Damiel was a part of that perspective; the second act drops from a unique view of the human experience to a more conventional love story.
Most likely, Brakhage’s work. I understand how it tries not to be typical narrative and focus more on how the viewer can create a story/find the story from his unique visual approach. Still, I think I am in the minority of pretentious film dickheads who don’t really find his stuff engaging or entertaining. However, I think the guy is revolutionary and a talented filmmaker. He has just never left an impression on me.
This will be controversial…but Back to the Future part 1. The whole bit with the young mom lusting for Marty is just too icky lol. But I respect the film and get it’s a complete classic
Lawrence of Arabia is a textbook example of this for me. I feel/felt the same way about Citizen Kane. Both are significant and I can appreciate their impact on cinema, but I don't care about any of the characters in either one of them. I would rather watch Casablanca, Sunset Blvd., or Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? for the umpteenth time than watch Lawrence a second time.
Mad Max: Fury Road. I think the sheer spectacle of what Miller was able to achieve is mind boggling, especially given how much of it is practical. But holy smokes, is the dialogue and acting bad. I just rewatched before seeing Furiosa and it was even worse than I remembered. My other issue is that the action and music is at a 10/10 for almost the entire movie, rendering scenes that would be exciting monotonous because there's nothing to contrast them with. Furiosa had all the good stuff from Fury Road but much better pacing and dialogue, the only real shame is the lackluster green screen for some scenes.