Risselada

Under discussion:

Star Wars  (1977)

Flash Gordon: Space Soldiers  (1936)

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

Flash Gordon

I guess this was one of the first huge Sci-Fi epics made for the screen.  Maybe it was the introduction of Sci-Fi as we think of it into popular culture.  This series may even have even shaped how we think about these kinds of fantastical outer space travels with strange creatures, humanoid aliens, and all kinds of fantastical technology or the fact that we even think of these things at all.

At it's time it was the most successful serial ever.  And although over time these kinds of movies began to lose less interest and were relegated to smaller budget productions, when Star Wars revitalized this genre it was maybe just recapturing much of what was original created with Flash Gordon.

What is really amusing to see is what passed as special effects in those days.  And also what people imagined would be appropriate attire on alien planets and space vessels.  We get to see a lot of Frank Shannon's hairy old man legs all the way up to his crotch, and then some kind of saggy looking diaper bottom.  But Sci-Fi costuming today is usually just as goofy I suppose.

The cliffhangers from every single episode are resolved without even being resolved.  The solutions to every crisis don't even seem to make any sense.  At least any kind of assumed rule or established rules of the film universe or character traits are continually ignored.  There's absolutely no suspense because you can't invest in anything.  Any solution can be made up without any justification by the screenwriters.

It's really bad and silly especially by our standards, and yet you are so intrigued as to what oddity or strange character will appear on screen next that it's actually sufficiently entertaining.

Rating: 7/10

Under discussion:

The Adventures of Robin Hood  (1938)

Welcome to Sherwood! The Story of 'The Adventures of Robin Hood'

There's no Spout link for this movie.  I saw it on the bonus features DVD for The Adventures of Robin Hood.  It's a fairly extensive documentary, but not too long at just short of an hour.  For some reason it seems like at least forth of the DVDs I've rented this year have had Rudy Behlmer featured somewhere on them either in the commentary or some special features.  I'd never even heard of this guy before, but apparently he's an expert on like every major movie released in the Golden Age of Hollywood Cinema.

If you have any interest in the behind the scenes of what was going on with major Hollywood productions at that time, this should give you a few clues.

Rating: 8/10

Under discussion:

Drôle de Drame  (1936)

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

Drôle de drame ou L'étrange aventure de Docteur Molyneux

This is a fun little French farce.  You know it will start out fun when you get the preacher denouncing all of the sinful novels that have been published lately and then a serial killer who goes nuts saying these novels ruined his life.

I'm not sure if there's any point in digging too deep into it in this blog.  There's quite a bit of satire here as you would probably expect.  It may live in a specific time and place, but poking fun at things like greed, concern for self-image, false piety, mob mentality, drunkenness, and such are usually universal.

Entertaining the whole way through.

Rating: 8/10

Under discussion:

Smoke  (1995)

This blog entry is part of my “movie year countdown round #2”.  Read more about that here.

Smoke

It was difficult for me to decide what to rate this movie.  The film has great intentions.  And listening to the commentary, and the story of how it was made, and the approach of the filmmakers made me love it even more.

It has most of the things I would like in for instance  Jim Jarmusch film.  Simple and dialogue heavy.  Focused on little moments.  Interesting character but not too quirky that you feel like the word "quirky" is being pushed on you.

I guess some of the dialogue just doesn't feel real, while at the same time it feels like it's trying to be real.  This was Paul Auster's first screenplay, so he might not yet have fully understood how to write for the screen (at least according to my taste).  And I guess another thing I found lacking was humor.  There is a bit, but not of the same flavor that I sometimes get out of films in this genre.

If anything, watch it for the short scene with Ashley Judd in which she is amazing!

Rating: 7/10

Under discussion:

Gone With the Wind  (1939)

Gable: The King Remembered  (1975)

Gable: The King Remembered

This seems to be made by the same team that put together James Dean Remembered.  Again this documentary feels very dated.  Very 70's.  People have this creepy causal yet too hip and high minded kind of feel.  It's so hard to describe.  I guess the only exception would be Andy Devine.

Again, it's probably interested if you are a huge Gable fan, but I'm usually not terribly interested in the lives of these absolute mega-stars.  I just watched it because it was on the special features for Gone with the Wind and I'm anal about watching all of them when I rent a movie.

Rating: 4/10

Under discussion:

The Wizard of Oz  (1939)

Expo: Magic of the White City  (2005)

EXPO: Magic of the White City

A highly interesting documentary if you are interested in the subject of the Chicago World's Fair of 1893 but don't know too much about it.

Although almost all of the visuals are stills, photographs, drawings, the event itself was so surprisingly massive and epic that it consumes you for the full two hour presentation.

Actually the big of motion footage, the "B" roll as I guess you would call it, that was filmed as some of the reenactment of events are actually the worst part of this documentary.  They seem out of place and betray some of the director's strange obsessions with beer and erotic dancing as these are the only subjects that feature such footage.

I was totally amazed that such an even had occurred here in the city I now live in over 100 years ago.  And the fact that nearly all of the structures, despite their ornate and palatial qualities were built to be temporary and no longer stand makes it seem almost like a fantasy.  In fact this place even had an affect on The Emerald City in L. Frank Baum's "The Wonderful Wizard of Oz" adds to that.

You almost feel like the world was more of an advanced place back then than it was now.  The feeling like these people had an adventurous future ahead of them.  Where as now it seems like technology has advanced to a place where it's ruining us and alienating us instead of brining us together in new and exciting ways.  What happened?

Rating: 8/10

Under discussion:

Hard Eight  (1996)

Boogie Nights  (1997)

Magnolia  (1999)

Punch-Drunk Love  (2002)

There Will Be Blood  (2007)

This blog entry is part of my “movie year countdown round #2”.  Read more about that here.

Hard Eight

P.T. Anderson's Magnolia and a Punch-Drunk Love are two of my favorite movies.  I also think Boogie Nights is a very good movie, although it doesn't affect me as profoundly as those other two.  I just watched Hard Eight, and have yet to see There Will Be Blood.

So far my feeling is that each of Anderson's movies have been subsequently better.  Hard Eight is a solid movie with good characters and good use of a style that would come to be perfected.  Boogie Nights may just not appeal to me as much because I can't get entirely invested into the world of the pornography industry.  But it is still well done.  Magnolia is simply perfect, and Punch-Drunk Love is somehow even better in it's own way.  Due to this trend in my personal enjoyment of his movies and the unbelievable amount of praise I've heard from both the general public, critics, and close friends, There Will Be Blood is certain to be amazing.  And because of that I'm kind of putting it off to watching it until a day I feel like I need to see something I know will be great.

Anyways, as for Hard Eight there is no reason to gripe.  Some of Anderson's techniques are in more primitive stages, but it has wonderful moments (see a pack of matches spontaneously combust in John C. Reilly's pocket) and I like that he started out with a more simple story before moving into the more epic quality of his next two movies.

Rating: 8/10

Under discussion:

Gone With the Wind  (1939)

The Making of a Legend: Gone with the Wind  (1989)

The Making of a Legend: Gone with the Wind

I suppose since Gone with the Wind is such a long movie they figured the "making of" documentary should be longer than normal as well.

If you love Gone with the Wind but don't already know all about the story behind the making of the movie, then you'd probably find this pretty enjoyable.

I find the film to be rather humorless epic melodrama.  Although done well, not my favorite kind of faire.  So I enjoyed this documentary from a film history aspect, but there were a few times when it felt a bit tedious just like the movie it's about.

Rating: 7/10

Under discussion:

Helvetica  (2007)

Helvetica

This documentary manages to be both specific and very broad.  By following the history of this seminal typeface we also get a history of modern visual design in general.  What are people striving for in design?  What is the relationship between function and art?  Where were have we come from, and where are we now?  What are we reacting against?  Is there a reason to react or has perfection been achieved?

Although there is historical information presented here along with other facts (you can recognize how different graphic design was before Helvetica), this is mostly a documentary about people and different personalities.  We get to hear the opinions of different visual designers.  You can see how their opinions about Helvetica and other aspects of visual design reflect their personalities and attitudes.

Although I did not find this to be too profound, it is a fantastic documentary for what it is.  And when you finish watching this movie, you will be noticing Helvetica all around you.

Rating: 8/10

Under discussion:

La jetée  (1962)

Waking Life  (2001)

Shorts! Volume 1  (2003)

There was a stretch a couple years ago when I was a bit more interested in exploring the world of short films.  I had rented several DVDs in the series simply called "Short" released around 2000, primarily because it was the only DVD I knew of that had La Jetée on it.  Anyways I find that short films can rarely achieve the kind of lasting effect that is usually more possible for feature length films.  However it is a different art form in a ways, and has it's own separate challenges and benefits that I'm interested in exploring.

Spout sent me a collection called Shorts! Volume 1.  The result was pretty much what I expected.  A fair mix of the good and the bad.  Maybe a bit better than what I expected now that I think about it.  I think the main problem most short films make is trying to tell a story in anywhere near the same way a feature film would.  You can't expect to achieve meaning in a short film with the same methods used in a feature film because there isn't enough time.  You can fill it with exposition, but it doesn't matter if we don't have time to get to know the characters or the mood of the film.  And exposition generally only serves to get to a certain place that can't be reached in a short film anyways.  I think short films for this reason will more generally lend themselves to comedy, but as you can see most of the films selected for compilations like this take themselves way too seriously.

Anyways, that's some of my feelings about short films in general.  Here are just a few short opinions on each of the films on this particular DVD set.

What's Wrong With This Picture? - As the first film they are throwing at us, this film is pretty worthless.  In the commentary the director boasts that the total budget was only a few dollars for a cookie and a DV tape.  There's nothing original creative at this point about a stick figure that come off the page.  Such "special effects" are not impressive and the premise is the kind of thing that someone seems to think is funny but they can't explain why.  At least it's one of the shortest films in this set.

Chinese Wall - I liked this one better in reflection.  I'm not sure if it could have been executed better.  I'm not that excited by the idea to think of more effective scenarios for the "surprise."  I enjoy the simplicity of it at least.  I don't see enough Dutch films though.  Such tall people!

Dreamscapes - Something akin to a short version of Waking Life.  The filmmaker asked many people to recount their memories of particular dreams.  Then he took segments of a few of them and animated each of them in different animation styles.  Interesting to recognize the different kinds of dreams people have and the way they perceive them, and also to see some different styles of animation.  This short is nothing too substantial, but generally kept my attention without going too long.

In Absentia - Essentially a stylistic exercise.  There is extensive use of backwards footage, sped up footage, and other visual filters.  No dialogue from what I can recall.  I didn't realize what I was watching the first time around until listening to the commentary, but we are essentially seeing a suicide in reverse.  The effects and mood sustain interest, and again the running time is nice and short enough.

John and Mia - This is one of the longer shorts on this disk, and maybe the best one.  I suppose I have a penchant for laconic films from Scandinavia which helps.  To be rather candid I've had struggles with pornography and was affected by the main character.  The actor has a compelling face.  This is one of the rare short films that I really wish had been longer.

The World of Interiors - Another animated piece which doesn't present anything too original.  The squiggly drawing style is notable only for a strange almost cubist style.  But the constant moving of the lines tended to make me somewhat physically ill.  I understand the theme.  Sometimes you just can't leave your house.  But I feel like something more substantial could have been achieved even with this premise.

Dad's Dead - I enjoyed this one quite a bit.  It's a narrated piece with just a few strange little stories about a guy and one of his old "friends".  The film has so many visual effects that are so varied and fit perfectly with the stories and atmosphere.  And the effects are so artistic in a way that they are even more fascinating than something you may see in a big budget special effects film.

Ready - This one feels quinte