Sight and Sound (2002) Greatest Films Club - Page 73

glen_esq · 08-03-2004, 11:29 PM

#320 The Round-Up (Jancso, 1965) ***
The title refers to the round up of Hungarian patriots by their Austrian overlords after a failed uprising in 1868. The movie's about the affect of a military/police state imposing its will on a conquered populace.

A primitive, high-walled prison in the middle of empty Hungarian plains is the oppressive setting for the movie. We see various forms of psycholgical and physical cruelty used by the Austrians over the inmates of the prison, as the authorities try to determine if partisan leaders are among the prisoners. The interrogation techniques are arbitrary and illogical at times, but always putting terrible pressure on the prisoners, many of whom snap under the strain.

I haven't read a critical review of the movie, but I think Jancso is certainly drawing parallels to the then Soviet occupation of Hungary, perhaps even to the aftermath of the 1956 failed uprising. Both damning and very, very bleak.

Some of the imagery in this film was damn creepy. Prisoners being degraded, paraded around with hoods over their heads was quite eerie to watch in a film from 1965, given what we've seen on TV these past few months.

Jancso seen/ranked:
1. The Red and the White ****
2. The Round-Up ***

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Dome Vongvises · 08-04-2004, 03:52 PM

It's been awhile.

The General
Directed by Buster Keaton

Score: B+/A-

Technically my first Keaton film, it was a joy to watch.

Lew Crippen · 08-09-2004, 10:56 AM

Bigger Than Life is, on the surface a movie about how (accidental) drug dependency impacts a man, his life and family and friends. The movie begins with scenes of a picture perfect, 1950s nuclear family: Ed Avery (James Mason) is the handsome father, who supplements is meager income as a teacher by driving a taxi and his wife Lou (Barbara Rush) is the very model of the stay-at-home mom who lives only to be the dutiful wife and mother.

No one could be more perfect as a teacher, father or husband than Mason and no one more perfect as a wife and mother than Rush. But tragedy is just around the corner as a strange illness and miracle drug (cortisone) combine to bring Ed and his family problems that they are not equipped to handle. And here is the real core of this movie, as Ed disintegrates before our eyes, all of his values (and those of 1950s middle-class world) are ripped from him or distorted by him—and examined and questioned by the movie.

I’m not sure how good a movie this is, but it is certainly a very powerful one.

Brook K · 08-09-2004, 02:15 PM

#255 -- 1900

Bernardo Bertolucci's film tells the story of 2 boys, one a peasant, one a landowner, journey to manhood against the backdrop of Italian history from 1900 (marked by the death of Giuseppe Verdi) to 1945 (the end of facist rule). At 260m in its truncated form, one would be tempted to call this an epic, but it is really a charcter-based film with history almost always remaining in the background and relatively little action to speak of. There are none of the sweeping battle scenes one sees in Visconti's historical epics - The Leopard and Senso.

Gerard Depardieu plays the adult Olmo, a peasant loyal and protective to his people. He will eventually come to see communism as the answer for the plight of the peasants. Alfredo, an effete spoiled boy, idolizes Olmo for his physicality but will eventually resent him for it, especially when he suspects his wife is in love with Olmo. Played in adulthood by Robert De Niro, he uses his wealth mostly to avoid responsibility and buy friends. Other key characters include the family patriarchs, played by Burt Lancaster and Sterling Hayden. Two men who could have been friends but are kept apart by their class. Donald Sutherland plays the truly bizarre heavy, Attila, a farm foreman who will turn into a fascist leader.

It is a film about the ways fear and insecurity breed hatred and how people must be strong and willing to stand up to evil, told with a Marxist slant. Disjointed at times, I would very much like to see the full version as some scenes and characterizations feel out of place. It balances a realistic, sorrowful presentation of events with surreal scenes of violence and hate, mostly involving the Sutherland character and an equally strange aristocratic woman that he seduces.

From the version I was able to see I would say the strength of the film is in its performances. It is a terrific reminder of how strong an actor Robert De Niro was before he became a parody of himself. Alfredo is quite different from his American roles of the time but he lends the character a depth and sympathy that otherwise might not exist. Depardieu is equally strong, for a man who underwent something of a De Niro-like career arc himself, this is from the period when he was one of the best actors in France in films like Le Maitresse and The Last Metro.

But, and here the Visconti comparison can be made again, the finest part of this film is Burt Lancaster. Almost as if this character were an older version of the one he played in The Leopard, Lancaster is incredibly moving as the aging head of his aristocratic family. A man who built a huge farm and great wealth, only to be pushed aside by his uncaring son. A scene where he corners a pretty peasant girl in the stable and tells her how he can no longer achieve an erection, even as she holds him, it is some of the best work this great actor has ever done.

It is a huge production with detailed period sets and costumes. One need only mention two names to give you an idea of the quality they add to the film - Vittorio Storaro and Ennio Morricone.

In 1900, Bertolucci achieves several highly moving sequences, and has some wonderful performances and technical work, but the film was not entirely successful for me. The Sutherland character in particular, seems like he should be in a Brian DePalma or David Cronenberg film. The mix of surreal violence felt too jarring and out of place along with several clunky transitions possibly caused by the deletion of 50m from this version. Hopefully I can see it in its full form one day and be able to truly judge it.

Bernardo Bertolucci Films:

1. The Conformist - A
2. Last Tango In Paris - A-
3. 1900 - B+
4. The Last Emperor - B+
5. Besieged - B
6. The Dreamers - B

Bigger Than Life is one of the films I've had on VHS for awhile and not gotten around to watching. I'm not sure why either as I've been REALLY wanting to see it ever since hearing Scorsese gush about it on his Personal Journey Through American Film documentary.

Lew Crippen · 08-10-2004, 09:53 AM

Gold

This is a line uttered by a good many in the landmark Eric von Stroheim film, Greed. A fortunate win in the lottery by the future wife of an up and coming dentist is the beginning of the end for her, him and his best friend (among others).

Much as been written about the history of this film: that the first version by Von Stroheim was nine hours long and was cut by him to four and cut again at the insistence of the studio to just over two, that Von Stroheim disassociated from that movie, that he actually got into a fight with Louis Mayer, that he was a terror on the set, and on and on.

A four hour version is being shown on TCM—much of the missing portions are filled in with still photos and expanded intertitles. Even with what is missing and what has been altered, it is easy to see the power of this movie—most especially some of the simply incredible scenes captured by Von Stroheim.

A must-see.

george kaplan · 08-10-2004, 09:19 PM

The Sacrifice - better than Andrei Roublev and almost incomprehensibly better than The Mirror, this is nonetheless a Tarkovsky movie through and through.

Two more of his films on this list? Sigh.

179 watched
161 left

Brook K · 08-11-2004, 02:26 PM

#256 She Wore A Yellow Ribbon

I was wowed right from the beginning of this film. With its gorgeous Technicolor look and stunning backdrops, I was immediately reminded of Powell & Pressburger. John Wayne as Capt. Nathan Brittles is a typical Ford character. A man for whom soldiering isn't a job or even a duty, but his entire life. You feel he went straight from the womb to the back of a horse. With a week to go before retirement, he is charged with convoying the fort's women to a safer locale in the face of expected Native American attacks. Complicating matters are his lovesick lieutenants battling for the affections of a young woman.

The film contains many powerful elements and is another example of how Wayne was underrated as an actor when he had challenging material to work with - the anguish he feels for his dead wife, his strength and understanding in the way he manages and teaches the officers under his command, the meeting with the Indian chief where Wayne attempts to stop the conflict before the killing starts but is confronted with an old, exhausted man who has given up the hope that Wayne still feels.

But I was also surprised at how comic the film was. Victor Mclaglen is such an enjoyable presence as a tough-as-nails Irish carouser. The ways he and Wayne play off each other one has no problem believing that these are very old friends.

My one complaint is that the climax is rather anti-climactic. For all the buildup and portents of violence, there really isn't a payoff. But perhaps that is supposed to be part of the nature of the film.

A fine film that plays very much as a fusion of two of Ford's follow-ups - Rio Grande and The Quiet Man.

John Ford Films:

1. The Searchers - A
2. Mister Roberts - A
3. The Quiet Man - A
4. My Darling Clementine - A-
5. The Man Who Shot Libert Valence - A-
6. They Were Expendable - A-
7. Stagecoach - B+
8. The Grapes Of Wrath - B+
9. She Wore A Yellow Ribbon - B+
10. Rio Grande - B+
11. How Green Was My Valley - B-

Seth Paxton · 08-11-2004, 10:36 PM

Thanks to Lew I just added an extra viewing to my list.

Here I had seen Out of the Past for my Studio Era class a few months ago and had no idea it was on the S&S list till he brought it up.

Cool for me!

I really enjoyed it too. Noir is just a fun, if sometimes too formulaic, genre that makes even some of the lesser efforts quite watchable.

I also just finally worked my way through all of Dekalog. I was torn by the effort. Kielowski plays things slow, and that was even true in Red/White/Blue. Add to this all the Polish and the dreary setting and it comes off as a tedious viewing at times. Part of that also comes from the low level of activity since these pieces are basically character studies.

However Five was incredible (Killing), enhanced greatly by the most artistic look in the set, and I also enjoyed Six and Ten quite a bit.

In the end I liked them all and found the song in Ten to be a great summation of what I had just been through. The films really do need to be taken as a whole, reflected upon. I found myself questioning what these different lives meant to each other as well as thinking about how some person has a meaningless effect in one person's life, seeming to be ordinary and boring, while elsewhere their life is full of drama (such as the post office guy in Ten vs in Six).

I was not affected in a way to make me consider Dekalog a truly great work to me, but the films did affect my POV for the time being, I found myself falling into a different mindset.

I guess to me his films are much like he seems to have been. There is depth but he is reluctant to show it or to commit to saying anything definite. Everything must be mined from between the lines. That makes him and his films frustrating and intriguing at the same time.

He really seems to have had a focus on the idea of fate/chance/interaction. Not quite how lives are critically intertwined, but in how people come to interact in a seemingly random way yet with a determinstic mindset driving each of them individually.

I also think in Dekalog he comments on the idea of a Christian god and some of the shortcomings of human interpretation of God's will. He even says as much in the 100 questions interview (actually he is quoted from an earlier interview and reasked about it) found on disk 3 of the set. He also makes some comments about that random interaction idea in there too.

george kaplan · 08-12-2004, 10:50 AM

Bigger Than Life Sigh. Yet another 50's melodrama. OK, I know, go below the surface and there's all kinds of socio-political commentary about all kinds of things. But, I've got to be honest. I don't care! I love subtext and deep meaning, but the film has to work on the surface level for me to want to dig deeper. If Vertigo didn't work as an interesting surface film, then all of the great symbolism wouldn't mean a thing.

This is well-done 50's melodrama (just like most of the others on the S&S list), but well-done melodrama is still melodrama. If you hate bull fries, then no matter how great a gourmet chef is who prepares them, you still won't like them.

Compared to other Ray films, this is light years better than Johnny Guitar, and nowhere near as good as In a Lonely Place. It's about par with Rebel without a Cause, another overwrought 50's melodrama.

I remain baffled by the inclusion of this film on the S&S list, and frankly, astounded by the number of similar films that occupy far too large a percentage of the slots on this list.

Brook K · 08-12-2004, 11:20 AM

I probably don't want to know, but what is a bull fry?

Based on George's review, I'm pretty certain I'm going to LOVE Bigger Than Life when I get around to watching it.

I haven't seen The Dekalog recently enough to really get into a deep discussion about it, but 5 & 6 were my favorites too. I do think it is his best work - endlessly complex and thought provoking but most of the episodes reach you on an emotional level as well.

Dome Vongvises · 08-12-2004, 11:38 AM

Quote:

OK, I know, go below the surface and there's all kinds of socio-political commentary about all kinds of things. But, I've got to be honest. I don't care! I love subtext and deep meaning, but the film has to work on the surface level for me to want to dig deeper. If Vertigo didn't work as an interesting surface film, then all of the great symbolism wouldn't mean a thing.

One of the few times I agree with george. It's fairly evident that the inclusion of some of these films is more indicative of what the viewer is bringing to the table rather than what the film probably has itself. Notice how most of the time reviewers and critics love to use the "the film demands" or "the film asks" when talking about these films. Quite honestly, it seems like we're doing most of the work here.