WEEK 12

12. WHO ARE YOU, POLLY MAGGOO? dir. WILLIAM KLEIN, 1966

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two things about broken blossoms: (1) i am very glad to have seen it, and (2) i didn't like it at all. i expected a certain amount of racist ugliness in this film, and was prepared for it, but ultimately i found little else--visually, narratively--that overwhelmed or redeemed that ugliness. i wasn't so much offended as i was bored. the first film orgy film i've had trouble with. the only!

it is, however, as instructive to think about why you didn't like a movie as it is to figure out why you did, and thinking about movies is the basis of our whole enterprise here. so this is all good. i have a lot to learn about early film. i have a lot to learn about griffith. how did you feel about this one?

for this week, a film i know next to nothing about, a romp, a satire. i think it sounds fun.

WEEK 11

11. BROKEN BLOSSOMS, dir. D.W. GRIFFITH, 1919

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it has been a hectic week.
let's go back in time.
let's go far back.
to black and white.
and voicelessness.
90 minutes of silence, and noise.
hopefully the potential racial sterotypes
i've heard are in here
can be processed,
and in remembering
llian gish's participation in this and birth of a nation (1915)
one does not forget how amazing she is in night of the hunter (1955),
one of my favorite films.
sorry the post came so late,
i hope this one is worth the watch.

WEEK 10

10. BURDEN OF DREAMS, dir. LES BLANK, 1982
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werner herzog has said that the driving impulse behind his filmmaking is the simple desire to see things he has never seen before. this makes perfect sense to me.

this week, coming off the spare, quiet beauty of badlands:
something much more explicit, and i expect, in its own way, more violent--
a film about a filmmaker attempting the impossible.

WEEK 9

9. BADLANDS, dir. TERRENCE MALICK, 1973

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figuring out what to post this week, i felt like a sleuth following nowhere-yet-everywhere leads. i got it into my head that i wanted the film for this week to be the logical extension of the things i watched last week, and these parameters made me bounce around alot in figuring out what to choose.
after watching trouble in paradise, i wanted to go back further in time, and watch a silent film.
while mulling this over, i began to watch marnie, which made me abandon the silent idea and start thinking about posting a hitchcock film.
then i started watching sweeney todd, which i did not love, and thought of watching a musical i might find more interesting (like meet me in st. louis, which is constantly recommended to me and which i have yet to see).
then, last night, i re-watched the straight story, which made me change course once again, and think of watching either another david lynch film, something with harry dean stanton, or something with sissy spacek.
sissy spacek won out.
i have seen 1978's days of heaven, but not badlands. it's hard to find a sissy spacek related vehicle that i won't want to see, and if days of heaven is any indication, badlands will be visual insta-love.
here. it. is.