Sight and Sound (2002) Greatest Films Club - Page 96

Brook K · 06-26-2006, 03:50 AM

Yes, I love My Neighbor Totoro and would go so far as to say it is Miyazaki's best and my favorite animated film. Such a warm and pleasant film that perfectly evokes a child's trust in the security of their home, family, and natural surroundings. I love that there is no "evil", no crime, no crazy misunderstandings. The father actually believes what his children say rather than rejecting them out of hand, recognizing that they are all part of a larger spiritual fabric.

And of course the film is filled with Miyazaki's signature magic. Totoro is such a wonderful creation and the Catbus too! The scene in the rain when Totoro suddenly appears at the girls' side is among the most perfectly executed and moving scenes in any film. Joe Hisiashi's score (my wife just got me the Japanese soundtrack for Father's Day) is a tremendous asset as well. I really do feel like a kid again when I watch it. I'm a softie and have cried during lots of films; almost always from sadness. Totoro, and another Studio Ghibli masterpiece, Only Yesterday are among the only films I can think of where I cry out of joy for the characters.

Roger Ebert wrote a tremendous review comparing the sensibilities of Totoro vs. traditional American animation:

Here is a children's film made for the world we should live in, rather than the one we occupy. A film with no villains. No fight scenes. No evil adults. No fighting between the two kids. No scary monsters. No darkness before the dawn. A world that is benign. A world where if you meet a strange towering creature in the forest, you curl up on its tummy and have a nap.

#293 The Devils (1971) - Ken Russell's film of Aldous Huxley's novel "The Devils of Loudon", is a grandly mad affair. Oliver Reed stars as Father Grandier, spiritual and political leader of the walled French city of Loudon. Loosely interpreting his priestly responsibilities, he beds several women of the town. He's also lusted after by the nuns of the local convent. Into this sexual froth steps the ambitious Cardinal Richelieu. Anxious to increase crown (and his own) control over France, he appoints a witch hunter to investigate charges of witchcraft and possession at the convent and to come up with any charge possible against Grandier to end his control over the town.

Filled with chaotic energy, The Devils is a wild, thought-provoking, disturbing, challenging, and altogether exciting mess of a film. It virtually drips acid in it's attacks on the Catholic Church, societal conformity, the trampling of freedom by arrogant authority, the hypocritical demonization of sexuality, and other territory similar to that trod by Arthur Miller's The Crucible. The stylization, costumes, sets (designed by future director of similar crazed films, Derek Jarman), eccentric acting, score, all work together to overwhelm the senses with stimuli. I wasn't that familiar with Oliver Reed (with Hammer's Curse of the Werewolf about the only other thing I'd seen to this point with him in a starring role), except by reputation. Here he is superb, treating his role with complete seriousness and sincerity in a film where the wrong notes could have easily allowed it to slip into camp. Vanessa Redgrave is also terrific as the head nun in a biting, sexually charged performance.

But ultimately, The Devils is really a film experience that can't be put into words. One should just see it. Unfortunately that has been pretty difficult to do as this is one of those films that has been heavily censored and issued in a number of versions over the years. Hopefully Warner will finally come through with a high quality DVD of the complete version as the DVD I saw, while complete, could be improved upon a good deal visually. See it if you can, I was mightily impressed. - A-

Seth Paxton · 07-08-2006, 02:29 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by george kaplan

The Hidden Fortress

I was particularly looking forward to this one, since it's a big influence on Star Wars. Well, I do see how those two characters inspired C-3P0 and R2-D2, and maybe it's just cause we don't hear R2 speak, but man, I love the robots, while those two peasants were just the most annoying, stupid, self-centered, irritating characters imaginable. More like Jar-Jar than R2 and C3P0. And R2 and C3P0 (and even Jar-Jar) actually were helpful in their films. These two peasants were just a pain in the ass that kept trying to abscond with the gold, no matter what had happened or how many times they'd 'learned a lesson'. They definitely ruined this movie for me.

Let's not forget some of the other things lifted from the film. The most notable to me was the border guard riding off on a horse where they kill one and then have to ride after the other to keep him from reporting in, later used in Return of the Jedi in an extremely similar setting and setup.

I like this film, but its not my favorite of his by any stretch.

Anyway, just jumping back in after being out for so long. After losing my main CPU I've been slow to get back up to HTF speed. Right now I'm halfway through The Sacrafice and I gotta say that while Tarkovsky is a decent filmmaker, he just seems like a boring, slow-paced version of Bergman who I prefer much, much more.

His stuff has been a bit of a letdown to me. I mean the 20 minutes of driving in Solaris. Yeesh.

I can't believe you guys didn't like Pather all that much. Those 3 films were some of the nicer surprised on the list for me.

I don't think I came back with my comments about a couple of films

The Puppetmaster
Hou
I enjoyed the film, but this continues the Asian tradition of slow-paced, static camera films. It's clearly a cultural style and rather common (just look at Ozu or Kar-Wai), so I can accept it and shift my paradigm as a film viewer. Really its just the standard "the history of the world as I lived through it" story that many filmmakers have made, where its less about the character than it is a commentary on the events of the world (such as war, oppression, etc). See Breakfast on Pluto as yet another of these "biographies".

Beautifully shot, and while it is slow the scenes have a watchability to them. It doesn't engage you as strongly with narrative, but it is something enjoyable to look at. It's a different type of art IMO.

Fanny and Alexander
Bergman
Like I said earlier, I like Bergman. If you don't then you probably aren't going to like this film, though its probably more tolerable than some of his other work. I enjoyed it. It was rather Dickens-eque in plot, but with Bergman's oddly creepy yet contemplative style to it. The S&S has really made a Bergman fan out of me.

I'm going to try to get back on it and go through at least some of the shorter, "easier" films on the list and cut my "to do" down to something managable.

george kaplan · 07-11-2006, 07:06 PM

Young Girls of Rochefort

People always claim I'm too binary in my film ratings, so here's one smack dab in the middle.

On a S&S scale, where truly great films like Citizen Kane, Vertigo, The Apartment, M. Hulot's Holiday etc. get a 10, and truly awful films like Performance, Birth of a Nation, Do the Right Thing, The Mirror, etc. get a 0, I'd have to give this film a 5.

It's clearly way worse than the top tier films, but clearly way better than the bottom tier films on the list.

The music is listenable (it's not like some bad rap you need to immediately turn off), but it's nothing memorable (it's just a bland jazz-classical MOR mishmash). And in a musical, that's not a good sign. And the atrociousness of dubbing Gene Kelly can't be overstated. Every time he opened his mouth, instead of my usual enjoyment of him, I cringed and was completely taken out of the movie.

But given that almost all of the good films on this list I'd seen before this challenge, this film is certainly one of the better experiences I've had watching a film on this list.

Shawn Frank · 07-20-2006, 02:46 PM

I am joining this thread again. I was in it a long time ago but I recently started to watch movies on a regular basis again so I figured I'd throw my hat in. I have no chance of ever seeing them all, but... I will update with what I am at periodically, along with a few comments here or there.

Cheers.

Current total: 3 Last watched: Singin In The Rain

Adam_S · 07-26-2006, 11:15 PM

All that Heaven Allows -

OARDVD
7/26/2006
195th S&S film

gorgeous cinematography, stupid melodrama story. Jane Wyman and Rock Hudson are awesome but I just don't like the 'woman can't be happy' aspect of female melodrama
incredible color

really really amazing cinematography.

george kaplan · 07-27-2006, 12:02 AM

I basically agree with your assessment Adam, though I still think you gave it about 3 stars too many.

Adam_S · 07-27-2006, 02:35 AM

But I only gave it two and half, george,

Of course, maybe it's a little unfair to All that Heaven Allows, its not nearly as satisfying or entertaining as any of the episodes of 24 season two I'm also currently watching (hey I'll be interning in their post department, it's uh... research. yeah... research...), and the acting in 24 is better too, if only you could get Kim out of the whole damn thing.

I do think that All that Heaven Allows had probably the best ear for dialogue of any female melodrama I've seen. doesn't help though, I have no interest or respect for the stories of that genre. I am glad she didnt' die of brain cancer or some terminal 'headache' disease, the older beautiful woman dying plot must be reserved for Written on the Wind, I imagine I'll really despise that one, as I couldn't stand tripe like Dark Victory. I like that she finds a way out of a contained, controlled life, and escapes that TV prison the photography implied, that was a truly remarkable shot, haunting and evocative, it summed up the whole movie in one camera move.

I'm surprised, it's been more than four months since I watched a film from this list, I'd like to think that my efforts to reprioritize my life away from truly excessive film watching is working, but I still need to prioritize into more creative endeavors. :p I'll still be posting, I have one of my most long awaited S&S films waiting for me to watch from Netflix, "A Canterbury Tale" luckily I didn't watch much last month so I'm not being throttled right now, and got it day of release.

Unfortunately they didn't see fit to also give me the first disc of animaniacs, which upon rewatching will probably be enhanced by having seen the films on this list (apocalypse now parodys? I can't wait to see that, cause I completely missed it first time around). I think I'll try to get to 200 films and then knock off the really high ranking films I have left and probably resign from actively trying to complete the list. Too many two-vote films that are important, but don't require my attention just now.

Lew Crippen · 07-27-2006, 12:45 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Adam_S

... its not nearly as satisfying or entertaining as any of the episodes of 24 season two I'm also currently watching (hey I'll be interning in their post department, it's uh... research. yeah... research...), and the acting in 24 is better too, if only you could get Kim out of the whole damn thing.

...

Rarely have I disagreed more, Adam. Although I watched Season One and enjoyed it despite some very poor acting, by the time Season Two rolled around, I found that I could no longer tolerate the excessive pandering of the story line and the incredibly poor writing. I gave up on the series about a third of the way through.

I’m happy that you have an internship, but even with rose colored glasses, I’d be hard pressed to see the positives of the series.

Adam_S · 07-28-2006, 04:14 AM

*shrug* depends on what you like, I find it effective, and I love the bigger than life characters, I've always liked that sort of characterization. I also read a lot of scifi and fantasy where I get more of the same, and this show is pretty much urban fantasy anyway, no way most of those trips take five to ten minutes in LA. :grin: I really think Keifer Sutherland does wonderful things in terms of acting, though most of the first season was not as effective in that department for the rest of the cast, ie everyone except Nina. I think the second season is a step up with the Warner family sub-plot in the acting department. I wish someone would just shoot Kim in the head, but Alas. David Palmer is one of my favorite television characters ever, and as kooky and frustrating as his wife is, she's the most interesting villain on the show. It has all the problems of a long form serial but the entertainment factor is enough that I'm happy to endure those. Happilly, Jack kills a lot more people in season two, so it's much more exciting than season one.

A Canturbury Tale -

196th film
OARDVD
7/27/2006
I've a feeling I'll like this film more on a second viewing, but it's still an exceptional piece of work, just superb from end to end.

An American soldier gets off a train a stop before Canturbury, and he's quickly thrown together with a brit soldier waiting for a bus and a newly disembarked woman. They escort her to her hotel but are acosted along the way by a mysterious figure. The rest of the story is their attempt to figure out what was up with the prankish incident, but by the end we discover that's much less important than the journey with them these past few days, and the discovery that there are still pilgrims on Canterbury Road.

Wonderful camerawork, especially some of the elegant shots of Canterbury. the opening dark bits are highly evocative and the film dances gracefully about the idylls of the country town.

Writing this I wish I hadn't sent it back to netflix I wouldn't mind giving it another spin now that I've formalized some thoughts on it.

An excellent film that will be better on a second viewing.

Adam