Monday, 7 July 2008 10:50 pm
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deckardcanineI saw five movies in the last week. Guess I'm a junkie. Here are the ones aside from Get Smart:
Wuthering Heights. I tend not to like romance movies, perhaps especially when the lovers are married to other people. But somehow, while this story reminded me of movies that didn't do much for me (ones that keep getting compared to The Bridges of Madison County, I notice), I enjoyed it quite a bit. Maybe it has more non-romantic factors working in its favor. Or maybe I'm just biased toward the old.
With this, I've seen 8 of the 10 Academy Best Picture nominees from 1939. Offhand, it deserved the nomination.
Diner. All I really knew about this one before was that the American Film Institute found it quite funny. Only after seeing the DVD extras did I understand that it's counted as kind of a set with three other Barry Levinson films set in early- or mid-20th-century Baltimore, including the underrated Liberty Heights. It's not quite as credible as LH, what with the severe obsessions some characters have, but it is a little funnier. More than anything, it reinforced my notion that I have to stop watching comedies by myself.
She Done Him Wrong. So what do I get next at the store and watch alone? Another AFI-lauded comedy. This one has a pretty middling IMDb rating, but it does have a distinguished place in history, both as the first film to star Mae West and as the one to single-handedly save Paramount from Depression-era bankruptcy. For all my love of old movies, I had never seen West in my life. The persona she puts forth in this movie does not remind me of any contemporary actress, and I doubt whether any could do her justice, despite many cartoon impressions of her. Some of the humor is dated, but the censor-unnerving dialog remains very juicy throughout.
Nights of Cabiria. My third Federico Fellini viewing. I'm pleased to have recognized in no time the same lead actress as in La Strada. Some viewers have called Giulietta Masina a female Charlie Chaplin, but if she brought as much humor to this movie, it got mostly lost in translation. The story is only slightly less tragic than La Strada, what with Cabiria consistently falling for the wrong men and paying the price. No longer playing such a simple-minded cutie, Masina often assumes an angry sort of grin and berates people who have nothing to do with her troubles. It's no party movie, but I admire the talent in it, and it's not strange or distasteful like 8 1/2.
Wuthering Heights. I tend not to like romance movies, perhaps especially when the lovers are married to other people. But somehow, while this story reminded me of movies that didn't do much for me (ones that keep getting compared to The Bridges of Madison County, I notice), I enjoyed it quite a bit. Maybe it has more non-romantic factors working in its favor. Or maybe I'm just biased toward the old.
With this, I've seen 8 of the 10 Academy Best Picture nominees from 1939. Offhand, it deserved the nomination.
Diner. All I really knew about this one before was that the American Film Institute found it quite funny. Only after seeing the DVD extras did I understand that it's counted as kind of a set with three other Barry Levinson films set in early- or mid-20th-century Baltimore, including the underrated Liberty Heights. It's not quite as credible as LH, what with the severe obsessions some characters have, but it is a little funnier. More than anything, it reinforced my notion that I have to stop watching comedies by myself.
She Done Him Wrong. So what do I get next at the store and watch alone? Another AFI-lauded comedy. This one has a pretty middling IMDb rating, but it does have a distinguished place in history, both as the first film to star Mae West and as the one to single-handedly save Paramount from Depression-era bankruptcy. For all my love of old movies, I had never seen West in my life. The persona she puts forth in this movie does not remind me of any contemporary actress, and I doubt whether any could do her justice, despite many cartoon impressions of her. Some of the humor is dated, but the censor-unnerving dialog remains very juicy throughout.
Nights of Cabiria. My third Federico Fellini viewing. I'm pleased to have recognized in no time the same lead actress as in La Strada. Some viewers have called Giulietta Masina a female Charlie Chaplin, but if she brought as much humor to this movie, it got mostly lost in translation. The story is only slightly less tragic than La Strada, what with Cabiria consistently falling for the wrong men and paying the price. No longer playing such a simple-minded cutie, Masina often assumes an angry sort of grin and berates people who have nothing to do with her troubles. It's no party movie, but I admire the talent in it, and it's not strange or distasteful like 8 1/2.