FILM ORGY

WEEK 73

2010-04-13T23:57:00.001-07:00

73. A PLACE IN THE SUN, dir. GEORGE STEVENS, 1951

WEEK 72

2010-04-07T08:05:00.000-07:00

72. CLEO FROM 5 to 7, dir. AGNES VARDA, 1962

we've been without internet for quite some time, just got it back!
it was a good break, though i'm sorry for the late post:)
i loved juliet's last "any film, any director, any time" post. i watched a couple random documentaries -- this and this,
and went on monday night to see this, which i thought absolutely incredible. surely watched some other things that are slipping my memory...
i saw 'the beaches of agnes' (2008) awhile ago, loved 'the gleaners and i' (2000), but have never seen cleo:)

WEEK 71

2010-03-29T19:49:00.000-07:00

MANY OPTIONS.

71. ANY FILM IN THE THEATER, dir. ANYBODY, ANYTIME

Maybe this is a cheap trick.

I don't want to stray too far from the FO model of specific film assignments, but this week I'd like to try going out into the world and comparing notes when we get back. I considered picking something I know I'd like to see this week, but one can't count on a film's availability everywhere...so let's keep it loose.

Don't be surprised if I come back in seven days talking about one or all of the following: films by Ross Lipman, SWEETGRASS, HARMONY & ME, or something else that might come out on Friday. There's some nice stuff out at the moment.

***LET'S GO TO THE MOVIES***

WEEK 70

2010-03-22T19:57:00.000-07:00

not to be lame,
but to be honest.
sometimes life gets in the way,
and sometimes you are in the mood to watch things you hadn't intended on watching,
then realize they have taken the little space you had in the week
to watch the things you planned to watch.
sometimes life requires catch up
and more catch up
and more.
for this, this blog kind of rocks, because unlike life-life,
which generally just keeps a-rolling and doesn't really give you catch up time but more a choice between things to let slide forever and things to check off,
here we can actually feel like we get some do-overs:)
so i'm taking mine. again.
see ya next week. when i will have finally finished the last half-hour of l'avventura (!!) and watched last weeks pick.
xx

WEEK 69

2010-03-15T11:05:00.000-07:00

69. MEMORIES OF MURDER, dir. BONG JOON-HO, 2003

We watched THE HOST and MOTHER in quick succession this weekend, both of which were great. I'd like to continue the train of thought.

WEEK 68

2010-03-09T14:04:00.001-08:00

68. L'AVVENTURA, dir. MICHAELANGELO ANTONIONI, 1960

i am posting this because:
1. it sits on a shelf in our house + i have never seen it (jarek has of course).
2. i read in juliet's interview with leanne shapton that she (shapton) is fascinated by monica vitti's hair in the film. i also am immediately drawn to piles of beautiful hair, it's a magnetic pull of something mysterious and enticing and hidden. like looking into something that is not explained, something rooted in the animal, in caves. and i think i like the feeling of semi-obsession, cannot-look-away-ness, desire.
3. i'm pretty sure juliet has already seen it, so, knowing that she has much on her plate at the moment, thought it might be a nice week for her not to re-watch but to catch up and breathe easy:)

oh, a p.s. to phantom readers of our blog: i highly recommend watching last week's post (who's that knocking at my door, martin scorsese, 1967) the night before going to see shutter island (scorsese, 2010). we did it, lots of parallels...

WEEK 67

2010-03-01T16:12:00.000-08:00

67. WHO'S THAT KNOCKING AT MY DOOR, dir. MARTIN SCORSESE, 1968

i loved mean streets (1973), taxi driver (1976), the last waltz (1978), raging bull (1980), the king of comedy (1982), after hours (1985), goodfellas (1990), cape fear (1991), the aviator (2004), no direction home: bob dylan (2005), the departed (2006). i haven't seen shutter island yet or this one,
and there are some i probably overlooked in this list + numerous others i have yet to see, i'm sure to add to my seen + loved scorsese list. his track record is incredible.
actually going to watch it tonight, to help stave off the getting-behind-trap i fell into last week:)

WEEK 66

2010-02-22T21:27:00.001-08:00

CATCH UP*****update @ bottom of page.

everytime i get on track it seems i get off again fast! sometimes for reasons beyond my control:
i never got to finish the friends of eddie coyle because more than 3/4 through the dvd froze + wouldn't start again. it was an impromptu + excited library rental, and one that i was extremely into watching until the dvd gained a mind of its own.
so i am unfinished with that one, waiting for a hopefully scratch-free disk to come in the mail
<>AND<>
i still have to watch juliet's pick from last week, which looks great, but i had a hectic week and didn't make it that far down the to-do list...
sometimes things move too fast to grab hold of everything in the time frame you set to keep. but now my weekend is upon me (monday/tuesday) so i'm looking forward to finding out the end of eddie coyle + watching your pick, juliet:) x
*UPDATE: i watched born to win this morning and thought it was pretty unbelievable (read:amazing). i found it the absolute perfect thing to watch on the tail of herzog's bad lieutenant: port of call - new orleans (2009), which we saw in the theatre last night. so i guess i'm glad i didn't have time to see it during the week afterall! i had many vague ruminating reservations watching bad lieutenant but couldn't really put it to name until i saw born to win. i think so much of my ability to connect to a movie is stitched into the subtleties of tone of the film, and here is where bad lieutenant:port of call + born to win split paths. ostensibly covering some similar issues, born to win for me hit the mark as it traveled the lines of humor + grit + the realities of illness/addiction, i laughed and also felt pretty devastated by what was in front of me, where bad lieutenant contained some/too many over the top and messy moments that just left me feeling pretty empty for the most part. it was compounded i think by perpetual laughter in the audience, which is always hard to digest when it seems more out of a nervous-i-don't-know-what-to-feel place. usually i like the i-don't-know-what-to-feel vibe in a film and sometimes the constant seeming-out-of-place audience laughter aids in my process of clarification of how i feel about the film myself, but not really this time. i think i wanted bad lieutenant to be born to win before i knew what born to win was all about. it feels good to laugh when it is clear you aren't laughing because there is something you are not willing to digest. born to win felt to me a difficult movie in terms of the emotions it coaxed from you as the viewer (be here and laugh with us now, be here and feel the weight of what this really means a moment later). if i am asked to be emotionally present before a film i want it to be worth my time + with born to win i got back what i paid out emotionally in droves.

WEEK 65

2010-02-15T22:47:00.000-08:00

65. BORN TO WIN, dir. IVAN PASSER, 1971

We had the great privilege of seeing INTIMATE LIGHTING the other night with Ivan Passer in person. One of the writers behind Milos Forman's early films (LOVES OF A BLONDE, THE FIREMEN'S BALL), Passer made his directorial debut with the beautiful INTIMATE LIGHTING before coming over to the states. Long live the Czech New Wave.

This week's film was Ivan Passer's American debut. Anxious to see it.

WEEK 64

2010-02-08T17:51:00.000-08:00

64. THE FRIENDS OF EDDIE COYLE, dir. PETER YATES, 1973

this caught my eye on the library shelf (criterion). ooooh the library is so awesome!
think i'll watch it tonight!
[i was behind on my netflix -- my source for nearly all film orgy views, great but requires a level of diligence which i am periodically lacking -- + didn't get things back in time for juliet's last pick, so i am a film behind, but just sent back cria cuervos so will get the new one in the mail + then catch up asap:)]

WEEK 63

2010-02-01T12:01:00.000-08:00

63. THE WHOLE SHOOTIN' MATCH, dir. EAGLE PENNELL, 1979

CRIA CUERVOS was a beautiful movie, quiet, filled with sweet sadness. Ana Torrent! Geraldine Chaplin! It is impossible to take your eyes off either of them.

I remembered the feeling of being a child.

Also, I'll be humming "Porque te vas" for the rest of the day today.

This week: Rhan got me this DVD for Christmas. I know nothing about it. Let's learn together.

WEEK 62

2010-01-25T16:21:00.000-08:00

62. CRIA CUERVOS, dir. CARLOS SAURA, 1976

i loved the spirit of the beehive so much it has taken all my energy
not to just repost it.
so, instead i've chosen another film co-starring ana torrent, the magical (and best dressed!) little girl from the spirit of the beehive.
sooooooo excited for this one.

WEEK 61

2010-01-18T10:24:00.001-08:00

61. ROOM 666, dir. WIM WENDERS, 1982

Something short and (hopefully) inspiring this week.

WEEK 60

2010-01-11T17:12:00.000-08:00

60. CLAIRES KNEE, dir. ERIC ROHMER, 1970.

somehow this will be the first of his movies that i have ever seen.

ERIC ROHMER, 4 APRIL 1920 - 11 JANUARY 2010

WEEK 59

2010-01-04T10:20:00.001-08:00

59. A GRIN WITHOUT A CAT, dir. CHRIS MARKER, 1977

I liked LATE MARRIAGE a great deal--the glimpse into another world, its frankness with sex, how tenderly it seemed to manage the perspective of each character. An excellent, awkward final scene. I thought it was solid.

This week: a major doozy. I am very excited to see this film.
We must put aside some time and attention for it.

WEEK 58

2009-12-28T19:18:00.001-08:00

58. LATE MARRIAGE, dir. DOVER KOSHASHVILI, 2001

i'm still waiting for last weeks pick from netflix, will post more once i've gotten + seen it!

WEEK 57

2009-12-21T09:45:00.001-08:00

57. OBJECTIFIED, dir. GARY HUSTWIT, 2009

FILM ORGY FAILURE: I got about 20 minutes into WHITE DOG before I had to turn it off. Not even my high regard for Samuel Fuller could redeem it. Was I hasty? I'd love a second opinion.

And Merry Christmas, by the way!

WEEK 56

2009-12-14T17:58:00.001-08:00

56. WHITE DOG, dir. SAMUEL FULLER, 1982

these films fill you with thought.
i've started where i should end.
begin again.
i've caught up (almost), have fi-na-lly watched
the spirit of the beehive
and
the seventh continent
(yes, i was that behind).
if it is a choice between dinner + the spirit of the beehive,
take a break from technically edible food
a n d w a t c h,
this film nourishes you so much
you'll forget you forgot to eat.
it is one to own,
i could watch it a billion times more.
i've yet to see a haneke film i dislike,
something about the way he tells
the stories he tells
fills something in me
that wants stories to be told to me in that way.
quiet and loud,
things are told and other things are held back,
the right things given and the right things kept hush.
something about this one was not as precise feeling as other films of his
that i have seen
but there were so many moments
and ideas --
still it holds so much and unfolds more and more
once the screen is shut off.
these are quite different films
but for me they are the same here,
perhaps this is an effect of having seen them pretty much back to back:
they both,
like probably any film one could claim to like or to love,
tell us something
about who we are.
(i am having deja vu, i think i have been here before, sat at this keyboard before, said this before).
yes:
they tell us somehting about who we are.
well, they half tell it.
it is not spoken loud,
it is whispered,
or not really even that:
it is spoken to us in a language we don't quite know
but we can decipher a few words
and the words we can extract
are thrilling words, new worlds in words.
they are intriguing words or fragments and we want to get the rest,
so we pay close close rapt attention
hoping to get it in full
even if we never can
because some things can never fully be translated or understood,
like life and things that happen,
and this is something that is uncomfortable but also something we want to feel.
or i do, i should say.
they are both concrete and vague
the way things really are
the way things happen and aren't understood when they happen
and maybe never are.
sometimes movies try to explain so much
when all you remembered at the time
was the color of the curtains
and that you had a nose bleed.
end at the end:
these are films that fill you with thoughts.
they are too, too, too good for this little blurb.

(looking forward to white dog, still need to re-watch withnail + i)
p.s. yo! have we been doing film orgy for over a year?!

WEEK 55

2009-12-07T10:02:00.001-08:00

56. WITHNAIL AND I, dir. BRUCE ROBINSON, 1987

WEEK 54

2009-11-26T06:09:00.000-08:00

THANKSGIVING BREAK/ CATCH-UP TIME!
BE BACK IN 2 WEEKS!
____________
realism:
The pilgrims (who did not even call themselves pilgrims) did not come here seeking religious freedom; they already had that in Holland. They came here as part of a commercial venture. One of the very first things they did when they arrived on Cape Cod -- before they even made it to Plymouth -- was to rob Wampanoag graves at Corn Hill and steal as much of the Indians' winter provisions as they were able to carry. (Suppressed 1970 Speech of Wamsutta (Frank B.) James, Wampanoag.)

WEEK 53

2009-11-16T18:12:00.000-08:00

53. THE SPIRIT OF THE BEEHIVE, dir. VICTOR ERICE, 1973

i have wanted to see this for so long.
everyone i know who has seen it goes on and on saying how mesmerizing it is.
i'm very very excited about this one.
although i am suddenly a bit behind in film orgy pics, nothing better than a film you desperately want to see to get you back in watching mode. yesssss.

WEEK 52

2009-11-09T10:23:00.000-08:00

52. THE FILMS OF HILARY HARRIS, dir. HILARY HARRIS, 2006 (compiled)

Organism [1975]
9 Variations [1966]
Highway [1958]
Longhorn [1951]

WEEK 51

2009-11-02T21:04:00.000-08:00

51. DAY FOR NIGHT, dir. FRANCOIS TRUFFAUT, 1973

jacques tourneur has been a film orgy revelation, first with CAT PEOPLE, and again with THE LEOPARD MAN. i thoroughly enjoyed last week's pick, from the brilliant opening shots through the clicking of castanets to the twisted (if tidy) ending. so moody and great fun.

this week: truffaut i've yet to see.

WEEK 50

2009-10-26T17:17:00.000-07:00

50. THE LEOPARD MAN, dir. JACQUES TOURNEUR, 1943

HAAAAAAAAAAAAPPPPPPPPPPYYYY HHHHAAAALLLLOWWWWEEEEEENNNNNNN.
the best holiday.
and in celebration, a revisiting of jacques tourneur + val lewton (of the glorious cat people of posts of yore).
viva halloween!

WEEK 49

2009-10-19T11:27:00.001-07:00

49. THE PUBLIC ENEMY, dir. WILLIAM WELLMAN, 1931

WEEK 48

2009-10-12T17:02:00.000-07:00

48. WHITE NIGHTS, dir. TAYLOR HACKFORD, 1985

the poster tag line is killer.
today was not a very good day.
this may seem an ill-fitting film orgy pick in comparison with weeks 1-47, which kind-of-generally-but-i-guess-not-always follow the loose trend of enabling us to slowly but surely make it down our films-i-need-to-see-before-i-die lists.
white nights might not make the cut but
i haven't seen this since i was a kid, and i loved it then.
twyla tharp did the choreography,
and though i have a feeling it will feel very dated and/or convoluted in terms of narrative, good dance never goes out of style, and, not having seen it since i was maybe 8 or 9, i'm really in the mood for this mid-80s mikhail baryshnikov - gregory hines vehicle. this baby clocks in at over two hours, so my main concern: more dance, less KGB-impregnated plot.
{haneke discussion to come}

WEEK 47

2009-10-05T11:17:00.000-07:00

47. THE SEVENTH CONTINENT, dir. MICHAEL HANEKE, 1989

i dropped the ball last week. i've yet to get my hands on a copy of LA CAPTIVE, though i intend to bypass netflix and rent it at the local video store tonight. discussion is definitely forthcoming.

there's a profile of michael haneke in the most recent new yorker. it got me thinking about his movies. it's also october, so i figured it might be appropriate to explore HORROR in all the meanings of the word. shall we look?

WEEK 46

2009-09-28T17:45:00.000-07:00

46. LA CAPTIVE, dir. CHANTAL AKERMAN, 2000

lola. i loved when she sang "c'est moi, c'est lola," and visually the film was great to look at... perhaps it's unfortunate that my viewing of lola coincided with the mackenzie phillips announcement of (non-consensual) consensual sex with her father john phillips (whose album was, until this point, nowhere near underplayed in our home), because watching the subtly sexual dynamics between cecile the young girl and the adult men of the film was difficult. at the same time, i loved the symbolism here: cecile petite was clearly represenative of cecile grande a.k.a. 'lola' -- the men could get close to the naive/young/carefree child but not touch her, where cecile/lola the grown woman was touchable but did not allow anyone to become close. although juliet said she abandoned an attempt at choosing films in keeping with the feeling of the fallen idol, she couldn't have known before seeing lola that it would be a pretty great in-keeping-with choice. both films were so ripe with quite overt symbolism, which can often get hokey but in both films for me worked quite well --
i realize i never wrote about the fallen idol, which i loved. like juliet i was surprised by how much i enjoyed the film, i was not expecting the perfect marrying of suspense and humor and moral bottom line. the young actor playing phil was mesmerizing, i could watch him say "baines!" all day. the film falls in line with certain older films i've seen over the years that manage to use almost over-the-top visual symbols (in this: the befriending of the snake, various shots of the main characters positioned behind or by bars of some sort -- cages at the zoo, staircases, etc.) to make a point again and again, without ever becoming overly corny -- somehow it adds greatly to the visual appeal of the film without one's eyes rolling forever back in one's head.
the coupling of lola and the fallen idol turned out to be surprisingly right on the money.
i have yet to see part 2 of the double feature: when i put the film in my dvd player on wednesday night it would not move past the f.b.i. warning screen and jammed the dvd player until jarek swooped in hours later to miraculously remove it. i have yet to attempt it again for fear of re-jam, but am going to try once more tonight before sending it back for another. hope to watch in the next few days!
looking forward to la captive. i saw a chantal akerman short film in high school that blew me away and has been eluding me on dvd ever since. it had to do with two girls losing their virginity, i thought it was "je tu il elle," but i think i am wrong on that... any ideas?
oh, and 'jeanne dielman...' (1976) was one of the best film-going experiences i've had, certainly one of my most favorite films ever.

WEEK 45

2009-09-21T11:05:00.000-07:00

45a. LOLA, dir. JACQUES DEMY, 1961

45b. LA BAIE DES ANGES, dir. JACQUES DEMY, 1963

there's what's right and there's what's best; our lies fall all along a spectrum of harmfulness and utility. i feel like i say this a lot, but just being an ordinary, upright human being is difficult work. daily life bombards us with questions and choices for which we receive no concrete guidance and for which there are no clear answers.
LIFE! sometimes i don't know how we do it.

all this is to say i loved THE FALLEN IDOL. it blindsided me, actually, with how much i enjoyed it. sasha picked a perfect film to satisfy her fascination with morality; what's more, this film, plot-wise, is utterly gripping. i was so tense. i really loved it.

i was daunted picking this week's film. i wanted to follow a train of thought from THE FALLEN IDOL, but, finding that too difficult, decided to move in a different direction altogether. i'm trying something new this week, a DOUBLE FEATURE by jacques demy, whose work i don't know well enough. i have a soft spot for LES PARAPLUIES DE CHERBOURG; these two films preceded LES PARAPLUIES. two films might be a tall order, but let's give it a go.

WEEK 44

2009-09-14T15:11:00.000-07:00

44. THE FALLEN IDOL, dir. CAROL REED, 1948.

i am thinking alot about morality, i am always thinking alot about morality.
i think this film will stroke the part of me that is obsessed with the constant ethical/ moral questions posed in everyday life, the small things that nonetheless keep me up at night.

i really loved julia. was amazed at the tying in of so much (motherhood -- human and country--, politics, citizenship, addiction, childhood, etc) in a way that illuminated all instead of (which easily could have been the case) becoming a jumbled and convoluted mess. the ending was perfect.

and: inglourious basterds!!!! i am hugely into quentin tarantino generally (i am constantly saying that jackie brown may be not just one of my favorite movies, but THE favorite), but regardless: yesyesyes!!! i loved it, too.

more to say, but running out the door. much written catch up in order these days. summer gets me behind, but it's getting colder and for film-viewing and just about every other activity that tops my activty-list, cold is good.

WEEK 43

2009-09-07T13:24:00.000-07:00

43. LES BONNES FEMMES, dir. CLAUDE CHABROL, 1960

1. JULIA was a compelling movie, and it revived my interest in tilda swinton, who for me was veering dangerously close to overexposure. i'm reined in again. she is undeniable.
2. it was only after finishing the movie that i realized erick zonca also made THE DREAMLIFE OF ANGELS, a film i've always liked a lot. it's a movie that is decidedly slower, quieter than JULIA, but zonca shows in both a talent for rendering worlds that feel dark and real and riddled with difficulty. erick zonca: henceforth on my radar.
3. the common thing i've read about JULIA: that it is a direct descendant of cassavetes. this is a great compliment. i agree that it is true.
4. AN ASIDE: because this is a film blog, i'd like to mention INGLOURIOUS BASTERDS, which rhan and i saw yesterday and which i thought was just great. an energetic, insanely violent revenge fairy tale that bears no resemblance to any sort of historical reality, nor is it meant to. critical opinion is divided. i loved it.

THIS WEEK: i need to see some claude chabrol.

WEEK 42

2009-08-31T16:44:00.000-07:00

42. JULIA, dir.ERICK ZONCA, 2008

continuing for the moment in the recent-release category.
hoping juliet and rhan haven't seen this already...
just got home, hectic day, promisepromise to add on w. models & night train comments once i am fully awake and alert.

WEEK 41

2009-08-24T09:45:00.001-07:00

41. NIGHT TRAIN, dir. JERZY KAWALEROWICZ, 1959

discussion of MODELS to come soon...

polish film noir this week. it's meant to be excellent.

WEEK 40

2009-08-17T19:26:00.000-07:00

40. MODELS, dir. ULRICH SEIDL, 1999

i saw animal love a couple weeks ago. i really liked it, if one can say they really liked a film about people and their deeply dysfunctional relationships with their animals, and with themselves.
models may not be as traumatic a watch...
i am only partly through our last film. it has been extremely hot and we are (reasons financial and political, the lack of funding works well with environmental ethics in this particular case!) air-conditioner free. the fans aren't cutting it and i've been loathe to be inside. however, pretty into what i saw before the heat drove me out of the house and into the lake. will finish it up tomorrow and add-on, i promise!

WEEK 39

2009-08-10T09:40:00.001-07:00

39. SHADOWS IN PARADISE, dir. AKI KAURISMAKI, 1986

IN THE LOOP: the trouble with having seen this film a week ago is that i'm forgetting the specifics. this is compounded by the fact that IN THE LOOP, even while i was watching it, had more good lines than i could possibly keep up with. solid performances, scathing insults, and a story whose basic points seemed scarily plausible. this is the kind of film that ordinarily might have slipped under my radar. i'm happy it didn't. i laughed a lot!

THIS WEEK: deadpan and beautiful. i love aki kaurismaki. i'm excited to see this.

WEEK 38

2009-08-03T17:17:00.000-07:00

38. IN THE LOOP, dir. ARMANDO IANNUCCI, 2009

posting a current film for a change, shock-value. and, i thought it might be nice for juliet and rhan to emerge post- or in-the-midst-of sopranos viewing into a new james gandolfini vehicle. looks to have potential. let's see how it goes.

i thought i would get to re-watch atlantic city by today. i didn't. however,
i did:
1. watch animal love (dir. ulrich siedl, 1995).
2. swim in the lake 4x throughout the week.
3. eat many, many grapes.
4. make a felted "sheepskin."
5. finish the 2nd season of madmen.
6. get through the work week.
etc.etc.etc.
none of this alleviates my guilt not having (re-)watched. my primary memory of the film is of susan sarandon washing herself with lemons at a kitchen sink in front of a window. a nice image, but not enough to post about. i remember liking it, but not much else. i went on a walk tonight to think about what to post, and wondered, "is the impetus to re-watch a film directly tied to the memory of the first time one saw it? if one remembers a film well after having seen it once, if it sticks in the mind vividly, is one more likely to want to watch again?" it would seem the opposite should be true -- the lack of memory should drive a desire to re-create memory. a hole wants to be filled. yet i think the more i love a film, that is, the more i remember having loved it, the more likely i am to want to rewatch it,
again and
again and
again.
i must have liked atlantic city, but i don't remember having loved it.
i should re-watch to be sure.

WEEK 37

2009-07-27T15:16:00.001-07:00

37. ATLANTIC CITY, dir. LOUIS MALLE, 1981

LA TRUITE is one of the stranger films I have seen in recent memory, though it was compelling throughout, in no small part due to Ms. Huppert (I second the love, Sasha). I've rerun certain elements of the film in my mind--her "PEUT-ETRE JAMAIS" shirt, the trout handling, the ending lines in particular. I am honestly at a loss. I can't decide whether it was important or forgettable, though I think I might have experienced it as both in about 30-70 proportion. Perhaps this is one to revisit (and Joseph Losey in general).

THIS WEEK: My love for Louis Malle has grown up in the past couple of years. Here's one I've never seen.

WEEK 36

2009-07-20T18:40:00.001-07:00

36. LA TRUITE, dir. JOSEPH LOSEY, 1982

at a loss for what to post this week, i was saved by jarek (thanx).
he knows of my undying love for isabelle huppert.

[more film response to come].

WEEK 35

2009-07-13T10:03:00.000-07:00

35. A MAN ESCAPED, dir. ROBERT BRESSON, 1956

LOLITA was even better and more darkly funny than I had remembered, and it is one of the few films I can think of that is perfectly cast. James Mason, yes, Sue Lyon, absolutely, and Peter Sellers, God yes--but today I find myself fixed on Shelley Winters most of all. I used to say that Lolita was my favorite novel--I hesitate to now, as it's been so long since I've read it--and from my experience of the book I cannot imagine anyone playing Charlotte as well as Shelley Winters did.* I feel this goes for everyone else in the movie, too; it's such a rare pleasure for an adaptation, especially of a book you love, to feel so satisfying and so right. Kubrick (and Nabokov) did that here.

This week: Robert Bresson. A filmmaker I've wanted to explore more deeply after having seen L'ARGENT some time ago.

*Certainly not Melanie Griffith. That remake just irritates me.

WEEK 34

2009-07-06T13:14:00.000-07:00

33. LOLITA, dir. STANLEY KUBRICK, 1962

to be watched, to be under watch, under surveillance, under the imposed and self-constructed morality of others, what does this do to a person? to selfhood?
the tenant for me was layered in questions. first, the question of human-ness, of the maintenance of sanity, of the lines that separate me from you and how easily they are blurred and lost. beneath that, the sense that sanity, and nearly, the soul, is easily eroded or comporomised when one does not feel safe, when information is passed too freely in the name of some moral code, resulting in power for some and near terror for others.
it was so funny.
and so terrifying.
i found myself laughing solidly for 5 minutes, and then suddenly feeling nauseous with strange fear.
i think if i had not already known of polanski's relationship to the holocaust, of being a child of survivors and i think a survivor himself, i would have felt that this film, with deep roots in what it is to be an outsider, to feel watched, lied about, out of control, came from someone who understood the power of whispers that become petitions that become plans. it was not an accident that the first woman we see booted from the apartment had a disabled child: physically weak, she made visible the weakness that comes from being prey. or, she is prey because of her weakness.
and all of this rolled into a murder mystery, which for me was a great backdrop, but i guess not where i ultimately found focus. i'm interested in who simone choule is to the film (real or imagined), and how she fits into what the film was about to me (which maybe is or is not what it was about to juliet!), but i haven't quite gotten that far in thinking about it yet. will make an addendum to this post once i carve out some more quiet-pondering-the-tenant time. i thought about the film periodically since i saw it, and solidly this morning while walking our dog. still haven't fully gotten where i want to be in my thinking of it, but had to post a new film nonetheless.

lolita was on tv the other day and i watched about 30 seconds before turning it off. i've never seen it and have wanted to watch it fully ever since.

ADDENDUM, 9 JULY 2009: my initial reaction to THE TENANT was to place it in line with the other polanski films i have seen from around the same period--repulsion, chinatown, rosemary's baby. polanski was fascinated by the descent into madness. i am tempted to draw a clear line between the work and the real madness of his own life, but ultimately this seems too tidy a conclusion. i wonder what he has said on the subject? (juliet)

WEEK 33

2009-06-29T10:48:00.000-07:00

33. THE TENANT, dir. ROMAN POLANSKI, 1976

______

gene hackman bangs his boot heel against the train station counter: a perfectly brilliant image to end a film peppered with brilliant images. very glad i saw this one. solid.

and now, THE TENANT, a film i've started but never finished. we here at film orgy seem to gravitate towards films of the 1970s. hope this is new to you, too.

WEEK 32

2009-06-22T18:57:00.000-07:00

32. SCARECROW, dir. JERRY SCHATZBERG, 1973

i'm all caught up.
it was radradrad to watch black orpheus, belatedly, in such close proximity to le samourai! not to become habit (i plan on consistency in weekly viewing once again from this point forward), but a great, great color palette jump from one film to the next.
i loved the gray shades in samourai, gray gray and blue gray and then suddenly sudden blue blue, real blue, bright blue, deep blue, train blue. the film felt to me like a study in concentration, of what it is to be focused, to move distinctly. i thought i should live in that room with steel-gray walls and doors and curtains and bedspreads of shapes, mainly squares, that only focus one's attention further. i should buy a trench coat and a hat and speak little, if at all, and carry a wire full of keys that hold escape from the places that attempt to break my concentration.
i also just wanted to wear the keys as a necklace, they were beautiful.

never seen scarecrow. maybe you have. if not, i guess the time is now.

WEEK 31

2009-06-15T17:19:00.001-07:00

31. LE SAMOURAI, dir. JEAN-PIERRE MELVILLE, 1967

i have seen two jean-pierre melville films (bob le flambeur, le doulos) and enjoyed them both a great deal; i am excited to see this one. much like sasha, i fell into a tv trap for awhile, but now i am back. oh, it's so good to be back!

WEEK 30

2009-06-09T13:20:00.000-07:00

30. ROBERT RAUSCHENBERG, WHITE PAINTING, 1951. **NO FILM POST THIS WEEK**

i am behind in film viewing. i feel a big white space. i've been developing blisters in the garden, i've had my nose in a book reading hazy and bone slicing descriptions of the bloody hallucinations and pits of war, i've been lazily staring at the wall semi-paralyzed at all that needs doing. it's time to catch up. i realized late last night that it was my week to post and rather than put another stone on the grand pile i've been collecting of things past due, i thought it better to re-up. i am watching too much of the wire. no, there is no such thing.
XX

WEEK 29

2009-06-01T10:53:00.000-07:00

29. BLACK ORPHEUS, dir. MARCEL CAMUS, 1959

WEEK 28

2009-05-25T13:11:00.000-07:00

28. THE LAST METRO, dir. FRANCOIS TRUFFAUT, 1980

i saw only 4 movies while i was away.
when i got home, we excitedly resumed & finished the 4th season of the wire.
last night we scurried around town, going to multiple video stores to find the disks containing the 5th season.
while looking at new releases, the box for the last metro caught my eye.
today i baked recipe-less cookies on a whim. they turned out pretty well, at least edible.
i'm posting the last metro on a whim, as well; i don't know much about it.
despite the whimsy contained in this first-post-back, i don't think the movie itself will be whimsical. it will likely far beat this post in quality to the degree that the post might beat it at whimsy. i must still be a bit jet-lagged, despite no time zone change. brooklyn - lagged. anyway, glad to be back to film-trading w. juliet!

WEEKS 25 - 27

2009-05-05T23:16:00.001-07:00

MON. MAY 18
THE LIMITS OF CONTROL, dir. JIM JARMUSCH, 2009
another film in which the museum site is nearly a lead character as much as the lead character; preferred summer hours. --SASHA

SUN. MAY 17
SUMMER HOURS, dir. OLIVIER ASSAYAS, 2008
loved it loved it, and so perfect to have seen directly after an afternoon spent overwhelmed at the met. --SASHA

TUES. MAY 11
THE ORDER OF MYTHS, dir. MARGARET BROWN, 2007
an excellent documentary about mardi gras in mobile, alabama, which to this day remains segregated. remarkably even-handed and surprising. i'm still thinking about it. --JULIET

WED. MAY 5
ANOTHER WOMAN, dir. WOODY ALLEN, 1988
a low-quality image from a pretty high-quality woody allen film. just saw this one tonight.
--JULIET

WEEK 24

2009-04-20T17:16:00.001-07:00

24. OPENING NIGHT, dir. JOHN CASSAVETES, 1977

"OH YEAH, AND WHERE DO YOU LIVE?"

CALIFORNIA SPLIT exhibits some sort of sneaky genius. it tells the truth about people trying to make it, about desperate people, normal people, extraordinary people, the people you notice, the people you don't. it's moving and terribly funny. elliot gould is number one.

so much of the power of this film, like others by robert altman, is owed to sound--the way the talking overlaps and fights for the floor, suggesting a universe of equally valid, individual, human voices. you pull for bill and charlie from the first moment of the first scene, and you never stop pulling for them, even as you wish desperately for them to stop while they're ahead. and i guess, eventually, they do--or at least one of them does. the ending is such a heartbreak, though the kind you find in real life at every turn. it's a perfect ending. i love this movie.

for the interested, a glimpse into how the film was meant to end here.

for this week, a no-brainer. a cassavetes film i am excited to finally see all the way through.

FILM ORGY UPDATE: sasha will be spending the next month in new york, and as such we're going to take a break from our usual back-and-forth posting until she returns. instead, we'll be updating a month-long film log, perhaps with some brief commentary to boot, to give you some insight into what we're watching and what we think. see you soon.

WEEK 23

2009-04-13T14:35:00.001-07:00

23. CALIFORNIA SPLIT, dir. ROBERT ALTMAN, 1974

____
i guess the thomas crown affair was not my all-time favorite
though i basically liked watching faye dunaway and steve mcqueen
the opening song drove me crazy (& the choral repeat 40 minutes in was nearly enough to make me cover my ears!), and the split screens and fade outs turning into hyper-detail and color were a little out of my thrill-zone. yeah, it felt dated.
glad enough to have seen the original, and was fairly entertained, but had quite a bit more fun watching the remake years ago. liked where they took the hats.
ahhhh. watching this made me think about writing. why good criticism is so hard to come by: it is easiest to write well about something that you hated or something that you loved, much harder to write well about something you didn't hate or love. most things are somewhere in the middle, or somewhere slightly more or less than middle, and to be able to write interestingly about the mediocre is a super-skill, one that i do not do not do not possess. watching something that doesn't fire me up in one direction or another, speaking to the things about which i felt not much, i sort of melt into not just an inability to say something new, but also a near inability to say anything at all, or to even maintain proper syntax-recall (i.e. "ahhhh.", run-ons, etc.)
watching the middle and trying to write is clearly an exercise to try out more often. so, for this rememberance if nothing else, good to have seen it.
never seen california split, but hear it's super. robert altman, for me, is a general do-no-wrong.

WEEK 22

2009-04-05T22:59:00.000-07:00

22. THE THOMAS CROWN AFFAIR, dir. NORMAN JEWISON, 1968

______

the thing about warren beatty, besides his being easy to look at, is that he's totally winning. there's something very c'mon, guys! about him. also, he is a disconcertingly natural actor, which is to say it's hard to tell if he's doing anything at all...but then again i like him every time i see him, so he must be doing something. these are my thoughts about warren beatty.

i enjoyed heaven can wait, found it entertaining, though things work out alright in the end for everyone except jack warden, which left me feeling a little blue.

i am in the mood for something stylish and fast. and so, the thomas crown affair. enjoy.

WEEK 21

2009-03-30T15:11:00.000-07:00

21. HEAVEN CAN WAIT, dir. WARREN BEATTY & BUCK HENRY, 1978

----
happy 72nd birthday, warren beatty.

**very, very disappointingly: netflix is still listing a "short wait" for satan's brew, and my lonely & single local video store was no help at all. they had various satan-related titles, but, alas, not this one, not even close. i hope to be able to watch the film this week, and belatedly post my response. the first time this has happened, and hopefully the last!

WEEK 20

2009-03-23T09:16:00.000-07:00

20. SATANSBRATEN, dir. RAINER WERNER FASSBINDER, 1976

when a woman ascends the stairs featured two japanese actors i've realized i like a lot: tatsuya nakadai (also seen in the face of another) and ganjiro nakamura (also seen in an autumn afternoon). i love these men. also, there was something in the way this film was edited--these abrupt transitions to conversations already taking place--that i enjoyed throughout. a good film.

i will admit to mining a certain other blogger's aesthetic in selecting this week's movie, satansbraten, though i am also generally curious to see more fassbinder (and especially a fassbinder comedy). let's watch.

WEEK 19

2009-03-16T08:37:00.000-07:00

19. WHEN A WOMAN ASCENDS THE STAIRS, dir. MIKIO NARUSE, 1960

-------
when one fights nature
one fights
himself
make the sand work for you, not against you
when the earth moves
it moves us
as well
when we fight blindly
the desires of dirt, water, sand and fire
we fight eachother and
ourselves
as well.
you can't fight it!
when you work with it
you learn who you are and
you become
more than you were before
and this world of dust is elevated,
too;
when you fight it
you make it evil
and you are reduced to nothing more than a bug
pinned to paper or
confined to a jar.
woman in the dunes
blew blew blew me
away.
i am still lost in just the visuals,
from the breathtaking opening credits of
black lines and black lines, through to the end,
let alone the music, things said,
and everything everything everything else.
if i was a gymnast
i would do somersaults and backflips
to see this movie
again
and again
and again.
--
living here is like building a house
on water when a boat
makes more sense...
it has to be a house or nothing
at all...
--
when i rented woman in the dunes from the video store
when a woman ascends the stairs was sitting
beside it on the shelf
and caught my eye.
similar titles.
this time the city
will be the star,
and how will it be different
from the sand?

WEEK 18

2009-03-09T10:30:00.000-07:00

18. WOMAN IN THE DUNES, dir. HIROSHI TESHIGAHARA, 1964
_____

i've been meaning to see this film for a long time.

WEEK 17

2009-03-02T12:20:00.001-08:00

17. SUSANA, dir. LUIS BUNUEL, 1951

_____

mondo cane made me feel like i was reading a
painfully outdated anthropology text
full of absurd exoticization
that makes you roll your eyes
feel sick
and want to cover yourself
in horror and shame.
i hated it.
ridiculous scenes of "crazed natives"
juxtaposed with the absurd but harmlessly painted
customs of white people in "civil society" --
the drunk germans didn't look their best,
but they were also not
breastfeeding pigs, missing limbs, or torturing whales.
it is one thing to show things as they are, without interruption or judgement, another to articulate this as the intention like a disclaimer to then be circumvented in order to shock and awe.
the turtle dying on the beach while the camera idly recorded was probably the only time this dual goal was actually accomplished, and probably the only moment i felt i was watching something perhaps worth my time, even as i wanted to sheild my eyes.
it's often painful to watch the truth,
but even more painful to watch the truth be manipulated
into disgusting lies.
this movie did nothing
for me.

i have high hopes, however, for susana.

WEEK 16

2009-02-23T10:20:00.000-08:00

16. MONDO CANE, dir. PAOLO CAVARA, GUALTIERO JACOPETTI, FRANCO PROSPERI, 1962

_____

you've had the universe explained to you, and you're bored with it. you've had the human body explained to you, and you're bored with it. you can call me a lot of things, but i am not bored.

let's talk about dialogue: so many brilliant things come out of johnny's mouth in naked that i wish i had taken the time to write them all down. this is a dark, funny, spare movie, my first mike leigh, and one that i don't feel totally equipped to analyze just yet. its attitude towards sex and violence? i'm not sure. but i do know, overall, that i really enjoyed it.

after seeing romance and naked in quick succession, i joked that i was done with "squalor pictures" for awhile. and then mondo cane caught my eye. the italian progenitor of the aim-to-shock "mondo" movement of filmmaking, i am drawn to see it, though i am uncertain of its quality and suspicious of its aim. one more squalor picture to close out the month. happy february!

WEEK 15

2009-02-16T11:35:00.000-08:00

15. NAKED, dir. MIKE LEIGH, 1993

_____

i saw two catherine breillat pictures last week, THE LAST MISTRESS and then, ROMANCE, for our blog. i now want to see everything breillat has touched.
i loved, loved romance. in a certain sense it seems perhaps a strange film to love, or at least not really a film you could blindly recommend to a passerby as a good one to watch. you'd probably have to really know someone before telling them to rent it. or, maybe going in cold is the only way. i loved the sterility of the scenes in her apartment with her untouchable mate, an early scene in her bathroom and shades of white and the only sound some sort of appliance humming.
let's try this again.
sometimes i feel i could write and write nonsensically about a film i have loved, without ever really being able to get to the heart of why i loved it. i rarely ever know anything about a film before i watch it, so i do not have background information at my disposal in the after-thought write. i half wish i had more to compare my response to, i have no idea if this was a well or poorly received film. however, although i love the idea of criticism, ideas and opinions on paper, i am terrified of reading reviews, i am terrified of my immediate response being shattered. the feeling of pure response (whether or not such a thing really exists) means everything to me, probably / certainly to a fault. i suppose we love things in relation to who and what we are, and to some degree it is impossible to criticize or applaud a film exactly because of this: it means something to us only to the degree in which it resonates with something about 'me', just 'me'. and of course, somehow great films are able to get inside us, all of us, grab something that in some way we all must share. this is getting sappy, and it is not my intent.
romance was sexually explicit, yeah. but the explicitness and the jarringness and what made me feel like i was watching something new and old -- a new expression of an old idea, the best thing -- was not the blatant sexuality but the blatantness of thought, of emotion and presence and detachment. the way the lead character expressed who she was, what it was to want what she wanted. why she did it, why she sought what she sought. the voice over, often only a few words, was for me, probably the most gripping part of the film.
i am still knocked over in thought after only one viewing, and at this point i think i could go on and on and ultimately say not much. proving further breillat's great feat in saying so much, with so few words, only hairs longer than an hour and a half. maybe that was really my intent. poor and ill-conceived written thought to prove the importance of a film. i'll take it.

i've seen naked years ago. i want to see it again. i think romance made me think of it once more.

WEEK 14

2009-02-09T08:28:00.001-08:00

14. ROMANCE, dir. CATHERINE BREILLAT, 1999

_____

i loved i fidanzati. it was slow, quiet and sweet, and it reminded me (in the best way) of milos forman's czech films of the same era--loves of a blonde or the firemen's ball. it is honest about love. it is beautifully filmed. it is worth seeing more than once. we rented il posto, olmi's precursor to i fidanzati, but we ran out of time to see it before it was due back. no matter. next time we'll enjoy an olmi double feature.

onto this week: ROMANCE. i haven't been able to get breillat's fat girl out of my head since i saw it last month, and i'm curious about this earlier film, a watershed in her career. i anticipate a shock to the system.

WEEK 13

2009-02-02T07:37:00.001-08:00

13. I FIDANZATI, dir. ERMANNO OLMI, 1963

________

from what i gather,
a film about
absence,
longing,
and desire.

a film i really want to see
and also
a film of convenience:
it is already at the top
of the netflix queue.

WEEK 12

2009-01-26T08:17:00.000-08:00

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

______

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

2009-01-19T17:24:00.000-08:00

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

_____
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

2009-01-12T09:12:00.000-08:00

10. BURDEN OF DREAMS, dir. LES BLANK, 1982
_____

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

2009-01-05T08:01:00.000-08:00

9. BADLANDS, dir. TERRENCE MALICK, 1973

______

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.

WEEK 8

2008-12-29T01:13:00.000-08:00

8. TROUBLE IN PARADISE, dir. ERNST LUBITSCH, 1932
____

the new year is rapidly approaching. i'm thinking a great deal in advance, making plans, etc. it's a good feeling!

my criteria for this week's film was simple: i have yet to see a lubitsch film, and so i picked the "best," or at least what is meant to be the director's personal favorite. precode, fun--the lubitsch touch for 2009.

WEEK 7

2008-12-22T09:18:00.001-08:00

7. CAT PEOPLE, dir. JACQUES TOURNEUR, 1943

----
be a good wife and
be happy

in the end,
we spend our lives alone

lines i remember from our last film.
i have seen so many films that tell such different stories, and yet sometimes i think, for the good ones, the foundation is always the same. it can be a family, a marriage, a crime -- when they end, to me they are always somehow about time, existence, mortality, and survival.
is it just me?
when i left the theatre after watching inland empire, all i could think was time. when i finished watching our last film, all i could think was time.
in the end, we spend our lives alone.

and we watch people slipping across the screen to forget this, to ignore hours and minutes, to forget the clock that needs winding.
or, maybe, we watch to remember.
often it seems it is in small moments that we gather the most information about a film. it's in could-slip-by-you-unnoticed scenes that the film whispers to us what it most wants us to know. for me this came in an autumn afternoon when the clock on the wall has stopped and must be wound. we are told here that time is always upon us, and we are simultaneously empowered by it and powerless in face of it. i really loved this moment in the film.
my house is freezing and as i'm sitting and typing and thinking about time and death i want to crawl under my quilt and watch something full of the fantastic and fright. i have seen the re-make of cat people, but never the original. i think it's going to be another gem.

WEEK 6

2008-12-15T09:08:00.000-08:00

6. AN AUTUMN AFTERNOON, dir. YAZUJIRO OZU, 1962
_____

where does one start to talk about 3 women? it's a wonderous, singular movie, and to borrow sasha's words, there's just so much there. we watched it twice yesterday, with and without robert altman's commentary, and i'm still at a loss to adequately describe all its working parts--its lost souls, its color, its landscapes, its performances. it was born from a dream and feels like a dream to watch. it begs to be seen again and again.

it is cold and rainy here. i must be reacting to the weather, as i nearly picked jazz on a summer's day this week, but having been advised that it was perhaps too out of season a choice, i decided on an autumn afternoon. slow, melancholy, visually stunning. i've been meaning to see this for awhile.

WEEK 5

2008-12-08T06:14:00.001-08:00

5. 3 WOMEN, dir. ROBERT ALTMAN, 1977

_______
about midway through watching our last film, i knew i wanted the next film to be 3 women. i have seen it already, but not for awhile, and, it is the sort of movie that having seen it once or twice means very little, it is brimming over, one is lucky to digest a very watery (yet, nonetheless thrillingly captivating) abstraction after the first or second viewing. i think watching the american friend made me think of 3 women not because there is plot-line similarity, but because there is a similar indefinable quality to the nature of the human relationships set before the viewer, one that simultaneously confounds us and mesmerizes us, and makes us want to understand, and to know more.

WEEK 4

2008-12-01T14:50:00.000-08:00

4. THE AMERICAN FRIEND, dir. WIM WENDERS, 1977

WEEK 3

2008-11-24T05:55:00.000-08:00

3. IMITATION OF LIFE, dir. DOUGLAS SIRK, 1959

---

watching our last film got me thinking about melodrama, perhaps terrain i wanted the lost weekend to fully enter.
the dictionary definition here feels shockingly biased --
melodrama: a dramatic form that does not observe the laws of cause and effect, and that exaggerates emotion and emphasizes plot or action at the expense of characterization.
can perhaps also be thought of as the linking of music and drama, to enter a new realm?
melodrama as a concept makes me think of the artist charlotte salomon, born in berlin in 1917, and creating 769 paintings before her death in auschwitz in 1943. the bones behind her work were inspired by the teachings of a man she called 'daberlorn', and his ideas regarding the elevation of life to a form of theatre, 'a form of existence in art that has more meaning than mere life.'

here, douglas sirk's most successful and last commercial film. i've never seen it, have you?

WEEK 2

2008-11-16T20:25:00.000-08:00

2. THE LOST WEEKEND, dir. BILLY WILDER, 1945
_______

wilder said that it was only after THE LOST WEEKEND that people started to take him seriously. and thank god that they did. a harrowing, alcoholic classic. let's watch.

WEEK 1

2008-11-10T06:32:00.000-08:00

i have been meaning to see this for awhile. watch it with me. already seen it? see it again.

1. LORD LOVE A DUCK, dir. GEORGE AXELROD, 1966
______

the aim of this blog will be to, week by week, implement a structure for film-viewing. this will, in turn, help to open thought that will then be applied to other areas. what we watch will inform what we want to read, what we want to make, what we think, etc. it will become self-sustaining, and life-sustaining (esp. in cold and colder winter months). JOIN IN. we will post the new film to be seen the first monday of every week. you will have a week until the next film is posted, hopefully this allows time to track down the film and watch. post to say that you saw it +/or reactions to the film in the comments section, as well as suggestions for future films and further reading, etc.