I find it kind of amusing that there was some talk about the trailer for X-Men 3, but no talk of the movie itself. I didn’t see the first two, but I come across chunks of them on TV so often that it would now be annoying to try to watch the entire films now. I’d been told the second one was quite good and the third one bad, but at least I hadn’t seen 15 minute sections of the third one over and over, so I rented it for no good reason. Continue reading Strangers With Candy / X-Men 3
Author: mauer
Christmas Wish List
I’m pretty sure someone did this last year. Anything anyone is really jonesing to get for Christmas this year, movie-wise? I’ve railed against bizarre box sets before, but I have to admit that this first season SNL set for under $50 sounds pretty sweet. I’ve wanted to see the Albert Brooks films for years, as well as some of the musical guests. Then there’s the ability to program up a full batch of Michael O’Donaghue written sketches. Continue reading Christmas Wish List
Altman favorites and successors
And so it goes. But he leaves behind a remarkable string of work that will go in and out of favor for decades, being rediscovered, evaluated and fawned over. I am sorry that Prairie Home Companion was his last film. It’s nice that it was that rather than The Company or something, so that he got to see another film of his play for more than a week in LA, but even up to Gosford Park, he managed to bring a good sized audience along with him.
So what are your favorites? I love the music scenes in Kansas City, and almost everything about Gosford Park. I’ve watched The Player maybe half a dozen times and could watch it again in a second. Nashville never moved me, good as I realize it is, but it did come in the middle of that remarkable string of films from 70 to 75. For me it’s MASH, The Long Goodbye and California Split, for Elliot Gould as much as Altman, for their creation of a mumbling oddball character and reimagining him three times over. Continue reading Altman favorites and successors
Guy Maddin’s Cowards Bend the Knee
Guy Maddin’s been talked about on the blog here , and michael at least had talked about getting some of his movies over Netflix, which hopefully he has. This one was made the same year as his amputee beer baron with glass legs (and Kids in the Hall) epic Saddest Music in the World. It only recently came out on DVD.
I believe that most of it was part of an art installation Maddin did where parts of the ten chapters were viewed by individuals looking through peepholes. Here, each chapter is silent, black and white, about 6 minutes long, and with a jittery editing that makes it feel like you’re hand-cranking the film along backwards and forwards to re-watch little bits over and over again
It involves hockey, abortion clinics/hair salons/brothels, murderous hand transplants, wax museums, ghosts, the Soviet Union, male and female nudity and a kind of tribute to Kenneth Anger’s Fireworks that really I don’t think anyone expected to see. Continue reading Guy Maddin’s Cowards Bend the Knee
The Tenant – Polanski (1976)
I feel like a pig shat in my head. And not because I had too much fun drinking last night. Nope, not a thing to drink – just the normal blinding, incapacitating headaches that come with a life of fear and paranoia in the big city. Still, my apartment is a relatively safe haven, what with its bountiful reserves of candy and bed. Such peaceful abodes seem to have eluded M. Polanski who should have taken the presence of Shelley Winters as concierge as a bad sign from the get-go. Continue reading The Tenant – Polanski (1976)
Chris Eigeman: Metropolitan (1990) and Kicking and Screaming (1995)
I’m annoyed with myself for being unable to write up a short appreciation of Chris Eigeman here; particularly in the context of these two films. I’ve meant to do it for a while; thankfully I don’t write for a living. These two films have recently come out in Criterion editions, and both were quite excellent debut features by directors who had little idea how to make movies going into these. Though Criterion has been releasing some newer American films, I think it’s worth noting that they didn’t do a batch of Stillman or Baumbach; just these two films close together, which have in common only the presence of Chris Eigeman.
I can also say that both of these movies would be – well, not terrible – but not nearly as good without Eigeman, who raises the bar on both. (Kicking and Screaming at least benefits from a decent Eric Stoltz part, but it turns out it was written for him just as filming began, and it seems a little tacked on.)
So, I’m just throwing this out there hoping that Reynolds or someone else will pick up the ball and write somthing interesting about him and the movies he’s been in. Continue reading Chris Eigeman: Metropolitan (1990) and Kicking and Screaming (1995)
Sunset Studio 60 Something
Terrible title.
Pretty good show though. I have a hard time imagining that I will care for these people and admire them in the way I cared for and admired the characters of The West Wing.
And it’s easy to make that assumption b/c so much of the WW cast is duplicated here. As an example, Matthew Perry’s guest stint on West Wing as the chief clerk (or something) for a hospitalized, dying Supreme Court Justice was great. He won an Emmy for it, I think. It had some gravity and walked a nice balance between something we can all relate to – someone dying we care for – and something most of us will never relate to – preserving massive political power for as long as possible. How can something like that be carried off in the setting of a sketch comedy show?
Continue reading Sunset Studio 60 Something
Altman’s Quintet (1979) / Reel Paradise
Trying desperately to throw a couple of new things up here so that anyone can pipe in with things they’ve seen of late. I had low hopes for Quintet and high hopes for Reel Paradise, but neither one really met with my expectations.
I had never heard of Quintet. But geez – a late ’70s Altman sci-fi film starring Paul Newman? And featuring a macarbe version of backgammon in Earth’s “Last ice age”? Well, sign me up! This ddoes after all involve many of my favorite things: Paul Newman, backgammon (macabre backgammon no less), wild dogs, ruined relics of World’s Fairs past, Altman, and late 70s sci-fi. What could go wrong? Continue reading Altman’s Quintet (1979) / Reel Paradise
Youth of the Beast / Short Cuts
Youth of the Beast: (1963) – a Yakuza movie that is mercifully unlike many others from that time – or even of the more recent vintages. Very fast moving, great colors, and a kind of double-cross by way of Last Man Standing / Yojimbo. But it also has the frustrations of trying to figure out a friend’s murder ala The Big Sleep, complete with a crushing ending. It also features a gay pimp with a switchblade, a sadist gangster wearing horn rimmed glasses cradling a cat as if he was a James Bond villain, and a zillion other stylish visual features. I’d recommend this very highly.
Short Cuts: (1993) – I was curious how this would hold up. When I last saw it, I had just moved to Los Angeles, and its depictions were nothing at all the city that I was living in – other than the helicopters.
Continue reading Youth of the Beast / Short Cuts
Sketches Of Gehry
I don’t want to be particularly snarky about this one, though director and interviewer Sydney Pollack makes a rather tempting target. I like architecture and Gehry’s buildings can be staggering. LA’s Disney Music Hall is. Seattle’s EMP Museum isn’t. Billbao’s Guggenheim almost certainly is, though I’ve not seen it in person. Continue reading Sketches Of Gehry