Risselada Blog

Under discussion:

The Great Escape  (1963)

Hogan's Heroes [TV Series]  (1965)

This blog entry is part of my “movie year countdown”.  To read more about that check out my first Spout filmblog entry.

The Great Escape

Supposedly (I guess I like starting out my blog posts with that word) this movie was supposed to be a very accurate portrayal of many real life events.  Yes they condensed many real life people into single characters, and they changed some timelines and orders of events.  But supposedly all of the sets and environment were very accurate.

It just seems so hard for me to believe.  The security is supposed to be so tight at these Nazi camps, yet how could these Americans sneak in all of these supplies and have all of these hidden rooms?  Maybe it's because the word Nazi has become such a monstrous word that it's hard for me to think of them as real people, but the Germans in this movie just seemed so nice and cordial.  I mean at least in comparison to other POW movies I've seen where prisoners are locked up in chains, and spit on, and shot at for laughs.  They do make mention that the camp was run by the Luftwaffe which I guess wasn't as harsh as other divisions.  Still to me, the movie kind of felt less like reality and more of a cub scout's dream of what it's like to be in the armed forces.  All American chaps and their allied cohorts, making jocular comments at the Nazi's expense, playing with baseballs and baseball gloves, whipping up their own alcoholic beverages.  It leads right into the straight up goofiness of Hogan's Heroes.

This is my first Steve McQueen movie too.  And from the stories he sounds like he had a real ego.  I dunno, I just don't feel too impressed by him.  Maybe I'll have to see some of his other movies.  I'd like to see if he can get a little more badass than this.

I don't want to complain about this movie though because for everything it does, it does it as well as possible.  All of the acting, action sequences, writing and everything are solid, and the whole thing is enjoyable.  It's probably the number one successful mainstream war movie, but you can't say that it really takes any chances.

Rating: 8/10

Under discussion:

The Saragossa Manuscript  (1965)

This blog entry is part of my “movie year countdown”.  To read more about that check out my first Spout filmblog entry.

Rekopis znaleziony w Saragossie (The Saragossa Manuscript)

I didn't realize this beforehand, but this movie is essentially a gimmick movie in my opinion.  I don't know too much about the source material, and maybe if I did I would have found this movie a lot more impressive.

The gimmick is something that I feel like could have been potentially more interesting to me, but just seemed a bit wasted and absurd.  Basically what ends up happening is that we get a story inside of a story inside of a story, etc.  The movie introduces a story with characters, and at one point one of the characters will tell a story.  The movie then cuts to that story and at some point one of the characters in that story will start telling a story.  Then the movie cuts to that story.  Sometimes the movie will go back to the people telling the story and sometimes it will continue to delve into more and more layers of stories within stories.  I remember counting at one time how many layers deep the story went.  I think it was maybe a dozen at one point.

I know this had become sort of a cult classic in the US in subsequent years.  Maybe a lot of drug taking hippies loved the story within a story type of thing.  There are some trippy and fantasy elements.

I can't say the movie wasn't enjoyable, but it does get a bit long.  I guess that's the point.  It's supposed to be epic.

Rating: 7/10

Under discussion:

Short Circuit  (1986)

Short Circuit

Hate me for growing up.  I remember enjoying this movie to some extent when I was a kid.  I even was surprised how many lines felt familiar when I just recently watched it again.  But also upon watching it again I found the movie stupid and the experience painful.  There's something so strange about some of these classic mainstream comedies that somehow seems like it took it's strongest hold in the 80's (but I know there have been and probably always will be films like this).  Something about how throughout the whole movie you kind of feel both totally detached and this feeling like you should be engrossed.  The movie does everything to keep you away by just giving you snippets of things, editing through ridiculous plot before you can really examine how stupid it all is, feeding you lines of dialogue that are simplified with Hollywood Squares type of humor and leads nowhere or tells you exactly what it wants you to feel.  At the end of the movie you sense that the character emotions, themes, and musical score are suggesting something epic has occurred.  But when you think back you can hardly remember anything that actually happened.  I've said little about Short Circuit specifically, but I don't know if I have to.  A characteristic of Short Circuit that I feel most other movies of this type also share is this blatent sort of worship of other generally shitty pop culture.  It's like all this stuff blends together.  Johnny 5's personality comes from watching TV and his name comes from a song.  It reminds you that most of the entertainment world is just shitty musical acts blending and breeding with crappy television, movies, and ads.  I feel like there are thousands of movies like this and if I end up watching another one, maybe I'll just copy and paste this blog for those reviews as well.

Rating: 2/10