Sight and Sound (2002) Greatest Films Club - Page 28

Lew Crippen · 08-08-2003, 10:48 AM

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the first weekend in September I have to go to Austin for my sister-in-law's wedding.

Stay away from 6th Street Brook. Nothing but bars and some of the greatest live music anywhere.

Pascal A · 08-08-2003, 02:57 PM

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In particular there is a very nice rightward tracking shot that ends with us finding the parents waiting on the steps of their daughter-in-law's house after coming back from the spa.

Yeah, that one particularly stands out. Anyway, Ozu did incorporate camera movement and 'techniques' like crane shots in his earlier films. Tokyo Story is a transitional film for him (to what would become his more 'mature', postwar films) and did have some camera movement. However, if you look at his later work, specifically from about Equinox Flower on, his camera was essentially static.

Certainly, more than Edward Yang's Yi Yi, Hou Hsiao Hsien's early films are somewhat Ozu-ish in the way that he uses the same vantage point everytime he goes back to a particular location in a film (although Hou varies the camera height or angle while Ozu keeps to his 2' height). You can definitely see this in several places in A City of Sadness, particularly in the recurring shot through a doorway of the patriarch's kitchen.

Brook K · 08-09-2003, 03:49 AM

I think Yi Yi has a healthy dose of generational conflict as well as the traditional vs. modern life conflict present in many Asian films. Perhaps its that both have a strong degree of wistful longing for something lost that can never be regained that brought up the comparison in my mind.

I don't think I'll have the time for anything fun Lew. We don't plan on being there any longer than we have to be and I don't think my wife would take too kindly to me leaving her in a hotel room with the kids while I hung out at a bar

. I drove down 6th Street the only time I was in Austin, but I went directly to the Alamo Drafthouse. Prior to HTF I read AICN for a couple of years and I went to the 1st Buttnumbathon 24 hour film festival, Dec. '99 IIRC.

My Malata all-region player fried itself last night so now I'm back to my original Sony until I can buy a replacement.

Lew Crippen · 08-11-2003, 10:43 AM

L’Âge d’or, the surrealist work of Buñuel, Dalí, and a bit of Max Ernst would not create riots and the destruction of art today, but it remains a testament to the destruction of authority and the ultimate suspicion and contempt that many artists and intellectuals had for what has become know as the establishment, during the period between the wars.

While it may help to have an understanding of what the surrealists were saying and trying to accomplish to understand the detail of this film, I think that its overall societal criticism still is clear today.

Brook K · 08-12-2003, 02:20 AM

Got a message from Netflix today saying they no longer carry Antonioni's Red Desert and it was removed from my queue. They also no longer carry This Island Earth.

Lew Crippen · 08-12-2003, 11:22 AM

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Got a message from Netflix today saying they no longer carry Antonioni's Red Desert and it was removed from my queue.

ditto

Lew Crippen · 08-12-2003, 11:42 AM

I'm Luke Skywalker! I'm here to rescue you!

So goes the dialogue in Star Wars and it is delivered exactly as written. This will probably be the only posting for this film in this thread, as everyone (and I mean everyone) has seen it many times over. This was my first viewing for many years and time has not improved the writing nor the acting.

Still it must be said that this film broke new ground and captured the imagination of every twelve year old (at heart)—and continues to do so. I had a fun time at the movie when it first appeared, but really thought that it was a Western dressed up with gadgets—the sort of thing that A. E. Van Vogt would have written (and probably did) and that I would have read on my way to sleep and remembered little the next day.

What a surprise that it has such a firm hold on its audience (and continues to do so). Viewed today, I no longer think that the lines are as tongue-in-cheek as I originally did—but it is a bit more interesting to look for the influences on Lucas. For example, I had delayed watching this again until after I had re-watched Triumph of Will as I wanted a fresh viewing of the Nazi rallies in Nuremberg to compare to the final scene of this film. What a triumph for Lucas. Who would have thought that combining a Nazi rally with an Olympic award ceremony would have meant so much to so many?

Trevor_N · 08-12-2003, 01:54 PM

Like you, I love Tokyo Story. However,

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while Ozu keeps to his 2' height

This is a common misconception - in his Ozu book, David Bordwell dispels the misconception in excruciating details. Ozu did, however, eliminated all camera movements and angles.

Pascal A · 08-12-2003, 10:39 PM

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This is a common misconception - in his Ozu book, David Bordwell dispels the misconception in excruciating details.

True, it's actually an oversimplification of his methodology for maintaining subject symmetry in the forground and background, which is not "the height of a person sitting on a tatami" as Donald Richie suggested; I just didn't think that it was worth going into details since the general range is about right.

Lew Crippen · 08-13-2003, 10:22 AM

Broken Blossoms is perhaps D. W. Griffith’s most finely realized film. It is not so grand as Birth of a Nation nor so complex as Intolerance, but though it is done on a much smaller canvas, the painting is perfect.

Perhaps the interracial love story no longer seems on the cutting edge (and even appears to be timid), viewed with the right pair of glasses it is easy to feel the despair of the young daughter and of the ‘yellow man’ as they find each other.

The sets and the cinematography on this old silent film resonate today with a freshness that defies the years. Look for example at the lighting in the Limehouse street from scene to scene or the interior of ‘Battlers’ house, with its lack of windows and posters of his past glory as a prizefighter.

Not to be missed.