What's on your Daily Viewing List? (9 Viewers)

[Dave Moritz]

November 18th, 2019 Monday

Mandalorian - Chapter 1 & 2
4K UHD Digital / Dolby Vision
7.1.4 Dolby Atmos
Disney+ via 4K Apple TV

 

[Robin9]

Fixed Bayonets which I watched last night is a very good war film. Sam Fuller really knew how to make them. The high definition transfer from 20th Century Fox is superb.

Tonight I'll be watching Nikita which I haven't seen before.

 

[Taylor * D]

I've been making my way through the "MGM Musical from the Golden Age" collection on The Criterion Channel streaming service. So many gems to be found here! I've thoroughly enjoyed Lili, Give a Girl a Break, and I Love Melvin. None of these were available to me growing up (I imagine there were very few VHS printings of any of these). There are so many wonderful things on display in those three movies (performances, camerawork, art direction, choreography). After reading about them for so long it's been a real treat discovering them.

Some of these are obviously unrestored (cue marks galore!) but they don't look terrible. However, the streaming service also offers Seven Brides for Seven Brothers but it's an older transfer and not the beautiful restoration from last year. Very curious.

 

[bujaki]

The Irishman (DCP) 2019. It zipped by in a minute. Gripping story and played to the hilt by 3 pros: De Niro, Pacino and Pesci. The first two have not been this good in years. Everything in this film works. My next viewing will be when it plays Netflix.
Suspiria (Synapse 4K UHD) What RAH said in his A Few Words about...This is a must own.
And today I just came back from:
Ford v Ferrari (IMAX Laser DCP) I really enjoyed this one, and Bale didn't mug that much. Quite exciting.

 

[Mike Frezon]

How's this for a Double Feature:

Peg and I have a STRONG affection for The Trip to Bountiful. It is such a well-written and well-acted film that it must be in our top-ten of all-time favorites.

I watched The Shining by myself. It was my first-time ever viewing of the film. Admittedly, scary movies are not a hot commodity in our home. But here's one with such a strong pedigree and is more of a psychological thriller than anything else. So I purchased the 4k/UHD release because I figured I should see what I've been missing. I certainly learned much about the pop-cultural touchstones that it spurred.

The film itself, however, didn't make much of a mark on me. It was engaging enough and held me to the end. I guess the thing that held me back from liking it a lot was the rather ham-fisted musical soundtrack. To me, it sounded like the music from the shower sequence of Psycho but for an entire 2 1/2 hour film. To me, the ominous music (which began over the opening credits) overwhelmed and distracted from the story which was pretty effectively laid out.

But the Nicholson performance was amazing. And the idea of "the shining" as laid out by Scatman Crothers character to the young boy was beguiling.

 

[Dave Moritz]

November 20th, 2019 Wednesday

Eight Below
HD upconverted to 4K
5.1 Dolby
Disney +

 

[bujaki]

The Innocence of Ruth (Kickstarter DVD) 1916. Restored by the Library of Congress. Directed by John H. Collins (who succumbed to the Spanish flu) and starring his wife, Viola Dana, this is a brisk 60-minute feature that has some elements of Daddy Long Legs, Wall Street villain shenanigans, virtue assailed and virtue rewarded. Studio and location work for a camera that is not wholly stationary nor static. Included in the disc is a 30-minute short from 1921, Brother of the Bear, featuring a young Mary Astor and Huntley Gordon.
The Blob (TT BD) 1988. I don't think I'd seen this before in its proper AR. Not bad of its kind and it injected that '80s anti-government paranoia that the simpler original version lacked. It also added a pluckier female lead.
The Docks of New York (Criterion BD) 1928. Hadn't seen this one since 1972 when MoMA screened a nitrate 35mm print. This one really holds up and almost every shot is imbued with what later would be called poetic realism. All that smoke, all that diffused light...

 

[HawksFord]

The Old Dark House (1932) - We'd seen this before, but this was the first time watching Cohen Media Group blu-ray. I'd picked it up from the Barnes and Noble sale, thought about saving it for next October, but decided we liked the film too much to wait.

It's a beautiful release especially considering the age and history of the film. The cast is great, and I am always struck by the performance of Ernst Thesiger who played Horace. He could do so much with a look or a simple line like "Have a potato." The direction and cinematography is also terrific with great use of shadows.

We also watched with the commentary by Gloria Stuart who co-starred in the film. She had some great observations about the movie and James Whale in particular, plus she just had such an interesting life. Coincidentally, we'd recently re-watched "My Favorite Year" in which she dances with Peter O'Toole fifty years after "The Old Dark House."

There's another commentary track we haven't listened to yet.

 

[Robin9]

I watched Seven Men From Now again yesterday plus the extended feature about Budd Boetticher.

Operation Crossbow has arrived today so I'll be watching that tonight.

 

[Montytc]

Independence Day (1996) Blu-Ray
Fun movie that looks very good. I know it's cheese but I enjoyed seeing it again.

 

[bujaki]

Zatoichi Meets the One-armed Swordsman (Criterion BD) 1971. Ichi meets Hong Kong martial arts and the result is quite exhilarating. Well shot and edited with a bittersweet ending.
The Bad and the Beautiful (Warner Archive BD) 1952. Beautiful encoding of this superior melodrama. The cinematography is worthy of the award it won.

 

[Matt Hough]

I have a backlog of TV from last night that I was too busy to watch then, but I really want to watch State of the Union again. It's on the TCM app right now, and since I haven't seen it in decades, I'm eager to experience it again. Hope I can get to it today.

 

[Robin9]

Last night I watched Operation Crossbow and what really struck me was that it's essentially a James Bond movie without James Bond and the factiousness that spoils those films for me. The film begins with the British Secret Service being required to tackle some big threat. The opening tactics are on a small scale and a glamorous woman comes into the story. The hero enters a huge industrial plant and suddenly the movie becomes a very large scale production. To save the world the entire complex is destroyed. It's a James Bond film in disguise! Fortunately, wisely, with none of that facetious attitude that makes James Bond films so vapid.

I enjoyed the film a lot. The Warner Archive Blu-ray disc is excellent except for the credit titles which seemed a bit out of focus.

 

[bujaki]

Two Naked films and a Gene Barry double feature:
Naked Alibi (Kino BD) 1954. A most entertaining noir with favorite Gloria Grahame playing a B girl. She performs a number that has her shaking like a cocktail maker. Production Code, where were you? Hot number! Well lit by Russell Metty. Gene Barry supports. Recommended.
The Naked Face (Kino BD) 1984. Roger Moore stars in a suspense thriller with its share of plot contrivances. Still entertaining as directed by Bryan Forbes. Anne Archer is always a welcome presence.
Soldier of Fortune (Koch Media, Zones AB) 1955. Gene Barry supports Gable and Hayward in this action picture directed by Dmytryck. I thought the transfer looked satisfactory.

 

[Matt Hough]

I did get to State of the Union this afternoon. Superb movie, and one every person no matter his political party should view. It holds such truths and so much common sense that were those qualities in vogue would surely make our country greater.

And it amazes me no end how Spencer Tracy and Angela Lansbury were overlooked for Oscar nominations for their performances. I actually think this is Lansbury's best work of the 1940s, and Tracy is always so believable and true.

 

[bujaki]

John Ford: The Man Who Invented America (TCM) 2019. Interesting take on Ford, the conservative liberal.
Bluebeard's Ten Honeymoons (TCM) 1960. George Sanders as Henri Landru. Story was first told by Chaplin in his trenchant satire, Monsieur Verdoux; later by Chabrol. This was shown in the wrong AR.

 

[Jeff Flugel]

Last night I watched Operation Crossbow and what really struck me was that it's essentially a James Bond movie without James Bond and the factiousness that spoils those films for me. The film begins with the British Secret Service being required to tackle some big threat. The opening tactics are on a small scale and a glamorous woman comes into the story. The hero enters a huge industrial plant and suddenly the movie becomes a very large scale production. To save the world the entire complex is destroyed. It's a James Bond film in disguise! Fortunately, wisely, with none of that facetious attitude that makes James Bond films so vapid.

I enjoyed the film a lot. The Warner Archive Blu-ray disc is excellent except for the credit titles which seemed a bit out of focus.

Well, Robin, I can't agree with your distaste for the Bond films, but I do agree that Operation Crossbow plays like one in many respects, and is a fine film to boot.

 

[bujaki]

The Mandalorian Ep. 3 (Disney+) Lots of blasting. Will Herzog return? The baby is cute as hell.
Waterloo (Koch Media Zone Free BD) 1970. Bondarchuk's follow up to his magisterial War and Peace concentrates on the Battle of Waterloo and displays his unerring eye for battle scenes. They're simply magnificent! Sweeping vistas with the camera dancing over thousands of military formations, quick and dead. One even understands what's happening in the heat of battle.
Unconquered (Koch Media Zone Free BD) 1947. De Mille's Technicolor epic looks quite good in this transfer. I caught one shot that was egregiously misaligned. It's utterly un-PC because the sentiments expressed are: "Only good Injun is dead Injun." Still, there's barely a boring moment in its long-running time.
Man of a Thousand Faces (Arrow Academy Zone A BD) 1957. Beautiful transfer highlighting Metty's camerawork. Is Metty an unsung hero of lighting? A largely fictional account of Lon Chaney's life. Hell, even Jr. never looked lovelier! But Cagney, Malone (sigh!) and Greer (sigh!) are very good.

 

[Robin9]

Well, Robin, I can't agree with your distaste for the Bond films, but I do agree that Operation Crossbow plays like one in many respects, and is a fine film to boot.

I recognize that my assessment of James Bond films is very much a minority opinion. I'm surprised that it is a minority view but I've become reconciled to that.

 

[Robin9]

Man of a Thousand Faces (Arrow Academy Zone A BD) 1957. Beautiful transfer highlighting Metty's camerawork. Is Metty an unsung hero of lighting?

Yes, to some extent. I think that's because the only time opinion-formers in the 1950s noticed his work was in Douglas Sirk films, and of course they gave all the credit to Mr. Sirk.

I know I've posted this before somewhere but any proper assessment of the work of Russell Metty should look beyond the Douglas Sirk films and take in famous movies like Touch of Evil, Madigan and Spartacus and lots of minor films like early Ross Hunter and Audie Murphy movies plus very much Naked Alibi which I watched a few days ago.