Terry's Grade: B+
Fred Astaire plays John "Lucky" Garnett, a dancer and a gambler who's about to give up performing to marry his sweetheart. But after he misses his own wedding, he sets off for New York in order to make his fortune and come back and re-claim his fiancé. He is accompanied by his faithful companion "Pop" (Victor Moore), who performed card tricks in Lucky's old stage show. In New York, Lucky starts performing with a dance instructor named Penny (Ginger Rogers); the two eventually, inevitably, fall in love. Also along for the ride is Mabel (Helen Broderick), the former receptionist at Penny's old dance school, who ends up as Pop's companion after recognizing the usefulness of their gambling skills.
Fred Astaire is a very famous name, but when I think about it, I don't really know if I've seen him in (m)any other movies. Ditto for Ginger Rogers. Looking at his IMDB page, I've probably seen his spots in The Towering Inferno and on Battlestar Gallactica (I'm pretty sure I've seen all the episodes of that show but that was a long, long time ago). Astaire and Rogers made nine films together, apparently, and I have to assume that this is considered the best of them all. When or if I'll ever see another one is uncertain, but I can't say I'm opposed to the idea.
In the latter half of the movie, there's comes a romantic scene with Astaire and Rogers that should leave the audience kind of giddy, but that emotional high gets killed immediately when Lucky starts applying his makeup for an impending blackface song-and-dance routine. I suppose that a modern audience should be able to contextualize a scene like this and not be offended by it, but it still kind of spoils the mood, and reminds us of the truism that it's impossible for an audience separated by the better part of a century to appreciate a work of art in the same way it was appreciated by a contemporary audience. I always try to bring an open mind when watching older movies, but that's not always enough. To make things even more awkward, we have to watch blackface-Astaire through several scenes following the song before his character has a chance to clean up. Also, the one actual black character in the movie is pure stereotype, but fortunately is only on scene for a few seconds.
There are some classic songs I didn't realize were in this movie: A Fine Romance is the highlight, but the first song we get to enjoy is Pick Yourself Up ("You pick yourself up // dust yourself off // and start all over again"), another standard. I've never considered myself a huge fan of musicals, but when the songs and performers are solid like this, they can be pretty enjoyable.
In the end, there isn't much to say for this movie. It's got good songs, good dancing, and good singing, and some of the jokes still manage to be funny 75 years later. Plot-wise, there are no surprises, but that's not really why you watch a movie like this. If you're me, you watch this movie because it's on a list of movies somewhere that people say you ought to see. And if you're me, you don't feel like you wasted your time on this one.
Sunday, March 25, 2012
Friday, March 23, 2012
Catching Up
I've been way behind on posting here, and I think I need to just get some stuff down before it's completely out of my memory. Each of these films deserves a full post, but given my current budget of free time, they're not gonna get them.
Singin' In The Rain (1952): A+
This movie is wonderful; intensely colorful, with great music, great sets, and extraordinary performances by Gene Kelly, Donald O'Connor, and Debbie Reynolds. I've got a full review on hold, so I'll put the rest of my thoughts there and post it.
A Streetcar Named Desire (1951): A-
Stanley Kowalski is a hunk. Too bad he's an asshole. This is a movie to watch with the windows open and a cold beer on a hot, humid, summer day. I'd completely forgotten about Karl Malden's love-hate-able role as Blanche Dubois' would-be fiancé, which should be a crime. Also, Tennesse Williams really was great at writing one-apartment plays, wasn't he? There's a reason this film is considered required watching in the civilized world.
Mr. Smith Goes to Washington (1939): C
I don't understand this movie at all; it's basically a propaganda film for America and the Boy Scouts. If you want to learn how congress works, watch I'm Just A Bill. If you want to see a Jimmy Stewart movie, watch Rear Window or Philadelphia Story. I'm seriously baffled why this movie shows up on lists of great movies. It's a kids' movie about politics. Really.
It Happened One Night (1934): B+
This is the first (and so far only) movie I've seen with Clark Gable in it, and I genuinely look forward to seeing more. I have some questions about this movie, though. Namely, I wonder why Gable's character has two pairs of pajamas packed in his single hard-shell suitcase. Is it purely for plot reasons, so he can loan a pair to Claudette Colbert, or is that just how people rolled in the thirties? Also, after Philadelphia Story, this is the second movie I've seen where a lower-class character lectures a higher-class character on the proper way to dunk a doughnut. I don't know... I don't pack one pair of pajamas, let alone two, when I travel, and I don't give a solitary fuck about dunking doughnuts. Maybe that's just me.
City Lights (1931): B
I am always going to get this movie confused with Modern Times. I just have to remember that Modern Times is the good one, and this is the not-so-good one. But I do like Charlie Chaplin movies, it turns out, so even the bad ones are worth watching.
The General (1926): B-
I don't understand this movie. Apparently it's a comedy? With hardly any jokes? The only scenes worth watching are the one where Buster Keaton repeatedly tries to enlist in the confederate army, and the one where a bridge collapses and dumps a train into a river.
The Gold Rush (1925): B-
It took us three days to finish this movie, and I'm not sure why other than the fact that it's just not really a gripping story. But there are some classic, really funny, scenes in this movie: the shack gets blown around, so that the door opens up out into a crevasse; and one of the prospectors gets so hungry that Charlie Chaplin starts looking like a roasted chicken. Sadly, as usual Charlie Chaplin falls in love with a girl that doesn't deserve him, but they end up together in the end so I guess it's a happy ending? Also, some of the opening footage is fascinating to watch; it plays like documentary footage of the Alaskan gold rush, even if it was staged for production of this film.
Singin' In The Rain (1952): A+
This movie is wonderful; intensely colorful, with great music, great sets, and extraordinary performances by Gene Kelly, Donald O'Connor, and Debbie Reynolds. I've got a full review on hold, so I'll put the rest of my thoughts there and post it.
A Streetcar Named Desire (1951): A-
Stanley Kowalski is a hunk. Too bad he's an asshole. This is a movie to watch with the windows open and a cold beer on a hot, humid, summer day. I'd completely forgotten about Karl Malden's love-hate-able role as Blanche Dubois' would-be fiancé, which should be a crime. Also, Tennesse Williams really was great at writing one-apartment plays, wasn't he? There's a reason this film is considered required watching in the civilized world.
Mr. Smith Goes to Washington (1939): C
I don't understand this movie at all; it's basically a propaganda film for America and the Boy Scouts. If you want to learn how congress works, watch I'm Just A Bill. If you want to see a Jimmy Stewart movie, watch Rear Window or Philadelphia Story. I'm seriously baffled why this movie shows up on lists of great movies. It's a kids' movie about politics. Really.
It Happened One Night (1934): B+
This is the first (and so far only) movie I've seen with Clark Gable in it, and I genuinely look forward to seeing more. I have some questions about this movie, though. Namely, I wonder why Gable's character has two pairs of pajamas packed in his single hard-shell suitcase. Is it purely for plot reasons, so he can loan a pair to Claudette Colbert, or is that just how people rolled in the thirties? Also, after Philadelphia Story, this is the second movie I've seen where a lower-class character lectures a higher-class character on the proper way to dunk a doughnut. I don't know... I don't pack one pair of pajamas, let alone two, when I travel, and I don't give a solitary fuck about dunking doughnuts. Maybe that's just me.
City Lights (1931): B
I am always going to get this movie confused with Modern Times. I just have to remember that Modern Times is the good one, and this is the not-so-good one. But I do like Charlie Chaplin movies, it turns out, so even the bad ones are worth watching.
The General (1926): B-
I don't understand this movie. Apparently it's a comedy? With hardly any jokes? The only scenes worth watching are the one where Buster Keaton repeatedly tries to enlist in the confederate army, and the one where a bridge collapses and dumps a train into a river.
The Gold Rush (1925): B-
It took us three days to finish this movie, and I'm not sure why other than the fact that it's just not really a gripping story. But there are some classic, really funny, scenes in this movie: the shack gets blown around, so that the door opens up out into a crevasse; and one of the prospectors gets so hungry that Charlie Chaplin starts looking like a roasted chicken. Sadly, as usual Charlie Chaplin falls in love with a girl that doesn't deserve him, but they end up together in the end so I guess it's a happy ending? Also, some of the opening footage is fascinating to watch; it plays like documentary footage of the Alaskan gold rush, even if it was staged for production of this film.
The Hunger Games (2012)
Terry's Grade: C
I don't read a lot, really, so I don't often see movie versions of books I've already read. Hunger Games does illustrate some of the problems those movies face, though; in translating page to screen, it's important to make the transition from telling to showing. The script to this movie is true in every major way to the novel, and this might be one of its biggest problems. It's almost omission by inclusion; every character gets his time on screen (no matter how briefly), and as a result hardly any characters get their due. A book has the leisure to fill in background and explain motivations; on the screen, we get only what we see.
Halfway through the movie, I was convinced that director Gary Ross didn't have all the necessary tools to direct a feature film. The story starts in the poverty-stricken, coal-mining District 12, then quickly moves via high-speed rail to the wealthy, narcissistic, over-styled capital of Panem. Both of these settings provide wonderful opportunities to illustrate the post-apocalyptic dystopia that Susanne Collins has created, and the art department doesn't disappoint; aside from a few wooden telephone posts and an electric fence, District 12 looks like 19th-century Appalachia, down to the hand-stitched dresses worn by the coal miners' daughters. And in the capital, every single individual has his or her own unique color palette--blue ponytails, gold eyeliner, purple suits, and facial hair trimmed to millimeter specifications. But it's extremely hard to appreciate the set design through Tom Stern's hand-held-camera shudders, close-zoom pans, and the unrelenting two-second-cut editing. When capital guards forcefully separate our heroine from her family, I don't want to see a close-up of a leather glove: I can get that anywhere (like on a Spinal Tap album cover). I want to see the juxtaposition of a white-uniformed, well-fed, soldier and a broken-down mother and her two starving children. By "juxtaposition", I mean put them all on the screen at the same time, dammit. These shots are so over-edited, it makes the movie feel cheap, as though the director is trying to hide something. It's a style that doesn't match the budget, or the subject.
In a way, these are some daring directorial decisions; the formula in a movie like this would be to start off slow, emphasizing the quietness and simplicity of home life before before building up to the shock and excess of urbanity and finally the furious brutality of the games. Paradoxically, the over-editing of the first act gives the opening of the movie a plodding feeling. Every scene feels the same, and the audience isn't given a chance to develop any emotional investment in the characters and their circumstances. The problem with daring decisions is that sometimes they just don't pay off.
Fortunately, things get much better after the games start, when the subject matter finally catches up with the director's style. Curiously, at this point we also start to see a directorial range that was lacking in the first forty-five minutes. When Katniss is stung by a "tracker-jacker" wasp, she is thrown into a hallucinatory stupor, stumbling through the wilderness like a hippie on acid, and having flashing back (in one of the few scenes that manages to strike an emotional note) to the death of her father in a coal mining accident. And when a fellow tribute and ally dies, the film slows just long enough for Katniss to lovingly decorate her corpse with wildflowers.
As a fellow film-goer noted, the makers of this film didn't really have to work hard in order to get the fans out to the theaters. But I seriously wonder if they've worked hard enough to get us to come back for parts 2 and 3. On a radio interview, I heard Jennifer Lawrence joke that her character would be played by Hillary Swank in the future. In the same interview, Lawrence discussed her hesitation to take on a role that had the potential to define her entire career. For her sake, I hope she isn't remembered for being Katniss Everdeen. She's a good, maybe great, actress, but it's slight praise to say that she's the best part of a mediocre movie.
Is this thing over yet?
I don't read a lot, really, so I don't often see movie versions of books I've already read. Hunger Games does illustrate some of the problems those movies face, though; in translating page to screen, it's important to make the transition from telling to showing. The script to this movie is true in every major way to the novel, and this might be one of its biggest problems. It's almost omission by inclusion; every character gets his time on screen (no matter how briefly), and as a result hardly any characters get their due. A book has the leisure to fill in background and explain motivations; on the screen, we get only what we see.
Halfway through the movie, I was convinced that director Gary Ross didn't have all the necessary tools to direct a feature film. The story starts in the poverty-stricken, coal-mining District 12, then quickly moves via high-speed rail to the wealthy, narcissistic, over-styled capital of Panem. Both of these settings provide wonderful opportunities to illustrate the post-apocalyptic dystopia that Susanne Collins has created, and the art department doesn't disappoint; aside from a few wooden telephone posts and an electric fence, District 12 looks like 19th-century Appalachia, down to the hand-stitched dresses worn by the coal miners' daughters. And in the capital, every single individual has his or her own unique color palette--blue ponytails, gold eyeliner, purple suits, and facial hair trimmed to millimeter specifications. But it's extremely hard to appreciate the set design through Tom Stern's hand-held-camera shudders, close-zoom pans, and the unrelenting two-second-cut editing. When capital guards forcefully separate our heroine from her family, I don't want to see a close-up of a leather glove: I can get that anywhere (like on a Spinal Tap album cover). I want to see the juxtaposition of a white-uniformed, well-fed, soldier and a broken-down mother and her two starving children. By "juxtaposition", I mean put them all on the screen at the same time, dammit. These shots are so over-edited, it makes the movie feel cheap, as though the director is trying to hide something. It's a style that doesn't match the budget, or the subject.
In a way, these are some daring directorial decisions; the formula in a movie like this would be to start off slow, emphasizing the quietness and simplicity of home life before before building up to the shock and excess of urbanity and finally the furious brutality of the games. Paradoxically, the over-editing of the first act gives the opening of the movie a plodding feeling. Every scene feels the same, and the audience isn't given a chance to develop any emotional investment in the characters and their circumstances. The problem with daring decisions is that sometimes they just don't pay off.
Fortunately, things get much better after the games start, when the subject matter finally catches up with the director's style. Curiously, at this point we also start to see a directorial range that was lacking in the first forty-five minutes. When Katniss is stung by a "tracker-jacker" wasp, she is thrown into a hallucinatory stupor, stumbling through the wilderness like a hippie on acid, and having flashing back (in one of the few scenes that manages to strike an emotional note) to the death of her father in a coal mining accident. And when a fellow tribute and ally dies, the film slows just long enough for Katniss to lovingly decorate her corpse with wildflowers.
As a fellow film-goer noted, the makers of this film didn't really have to work hard in order to get the fans out to the theaters. But I seriously wonder if they've worked hard enough to get us to come back for parts 2 and 3. On a radio interview, I heard Jennifer Lawrence joke that her character would be played by Hillary Swank in the future. In the same interview, Lawrence discussed her hesitation to take on a role that had the potential to define her entire career. For her sake, I hope she isn't remembered for being Katniss Everdeen. She's a good, maybe great, actress, but it's slight praise to say that she's the best part of a mediocre movie.
Sunday, January 15, 2012
Adam at 6 A.M. (1970)
"Hey, at least I'm not as barrel-chested as my pappy!"
Michael Douglas' second film is unavailable on DVD and used VHS copies start at $65. He plays Adam (though we never find out why at 6 A.M.), an increasingly bored, young linguistics professor who decides to trek into The Heartland of America for the funeral of a great aunt he barely knew. The best part is how dated this film is: it's like one of those forbidden looks at the past that feel a little too honest rather than the highly stylized or idealized versions often portrayed. It looks so authentic that it overcomes its poor acting (save Douglas and Joe Don Baker, pictured with him above) and plodding pace. This dated sense also fits in with how Adam sees the rural town as dated himself.
The film aspires to be more than it successfully delivers. Adam tries to debate a local wazoo about film (actually the wazoo confronts him about liberal Hollywood and nonsense art films) that brings back memories of Sullivan's Travels yet again. People want to be entertained, not reminded of reality. That's why Adam dodges his old job and signs up to clear forested areas for new conduits for power lines. He feels new meaning in his job, his coworkers, and his unrealistic girlfriend. Ultimately he realizes he was right all along and isn't prepared for vanilla ice cream.
Like the end of The Sopranos, Adam's exposition seems almost completely limited to this interval, and we exit the film without resolution--except that he throws two gallons of vanilla ice cream from the back of his car as he drives away and we get a freeze-framed look at the spilled ice cream in the sunset. It's a great ending shot really. I suppose given the symbolism of throwing away the plain life via the ice cream his future mother-in-law wanted him to get, there's a bit more resolved than the immediately preceding quick wrap up gives us.
Sudden endings are suddenly becoming popular again, but this film shows how it's not necessarily new (though used in newer, more complex ways). The focus on this is because another film I saw recently, Martha Marcy May Marlene (2011) also used this device as well as Meek's Cutoff (2010). They both seem to emphasize the psychological aspect of its use (like David Chase did)--to manipulate the viewer's experience of the film in such a way that they experience a similar sense of paranoia or lack of resolution as the character.
The film aspires to be more than it successfully delivers. Adam tries to debate a local wazoo about film (actually the wazoo confronts him about liberal Hollywood and nonsense art films) that brings back memories of Sullivan's Travels yet again. People want to be entertained, not reminded of reality. That's why Adam dodges his old job and signs up to clear forested areas for new conduits for power lines. He feels new meaning in his job, his coworkers, and his unrealistic girlfriend. Ultimately he realizes he was right all along and isn't prepared for vanilla ice cream.
Like the end of The Sopranos, Adam's exposition seems almost completely limited to this interval, and we exit the film without resolution--except that he throws two gallons of vanilla ice cream from the back of his car as he drives away and we get a freeze-framed look at the spilled ice cream in the sunset. It's a great ending shot really. I suppose given the symbolism of throwing away the plain life via the ice cream his future mother-in-law wanted him to get, there's a bit more resolved than the immediately preceding quick wrap up gives us.
Sudden endings are suddenly becoming popular again, but this film shows how it's not necessarily new (though used in newer, more complex ways). The focus on this is because another film I saw recently, Martha Marcy May Marlene (2011) also used this device as well as Meek's Cutoff (2010). They both seem to emphasize the psychological aspect of its use (like David Chase did)--to manipulate the viewer's experience of the film in such a way that they experience a similar sense of paranoia or lack of resolution as the character.
An example of the dated, low-budget nature of the film, perhaps.
Friday, January 13, 2012
Prefontaine (1997)
Terry's Grade: C-
As a movie, this is pretty awful. As a summary of the life of Steve Prefontaine, it'll do. Jared Leto plays Steve Prefontaine, R. Lee Ermy (that Marines guy) plays his coach and Nike co-founder Bill Bowerman, and Ed O'Neil plays assistant coach Bill Delinger. The movie is in a weird kind of docudrama style that pretty much fails: the majority of the film is standard historical fiction, but there are added "interview" scenes where the actors play their characters as though being interviewed for a documentary, and the film also includes some real historical clips as well as what look to be re-enacted TV clips. It sounded like the 90210 theme song was playing continuously in the background of the movie, except when they're playing some Hendrix or CCR. The old cars and the 70's mustaches are fun to look at.
It's an interesting story, though, and definitely one that deserved to be put in film. Apparently in 1998 there was another movie about Steve Prefontaine called Without Limits. I guess I'll have to watch it sometime, but hopefully not sometime soon. I'd like to see just a straight-up documentary, but maybe it'd be hard to get his personality across in a documentary if there's not enough footage of him lying around.
Despite its best efforts, Prefontaine does manage to be moving at the end, at Steve's funeral (he dies: spoiler). And the running scenes don't seem too bad to me, although I'm not a runner. I'd only recommend this movie to someone who's really interested in Oregon, running, or Steve Prefontaine. Preferably all three. Or Jared Leto, I guess. He's pretty hot in this movie, and takes his shirt off once or twice.
pretty sure this mustache peels off
As a movie, this is pretty awful. As a summary of the life of Steve Prefontaine, it'll do. Jared Leto plays Steve Prefontaine, R. Lee Ermy (that Marines guy) plays his coach and Nike co-founder Bill Bowerman, and Ed O'Neil plays assistant coach Bill Delinger. The movie is in a weird kind of docudrama style that pretty much fails: the majority of the film is standard historical fiction, but there are added "interview" scenes where the actors play their characters as though being interviewed for a documentary, and the film also includes some real historical clips as well as what look to be re-enacted TV clips. It sounded like the 90210 theme song was playing continuously in the background of the movie, except when they're playing some Hendrix or CCR. The old cars and the 70's mustaches are fun to look at.
It's an interesting story, though, and definitely one that deserved to be put in film. Apparently in 1998 there was another movie about Steve Prefontaine called Without Limits. I guess I'll have to watch it sometime, but hopefully not sometime soon. I'd like to see just a straight-up documentary, but maybe it'd be hard to get his personality across in a documentary if there's not enough footage of him lying around.
Despite its best efforts, Prefontaine does manage to be moving at the end, at Steve's funeral (he dies: spoiler). And the running scenes don't seem too bad to me, although I'm not a runner. I'd only recommend this movie to someone who's really interested in Oregon, running, or Steve Prefontaine. Preferably all three. Or Jared Leto, I guess. He's pretty hot in this movie, and takes his shirt off once or twice.
Monday, January 9, 2012
On The Marx Brothers (with reviews of Duck Soup and A Night at the Opera)
I do not like the Marx Brothers. I don't have any bad feelings towards them personally, it's just that if I had an hour or two of free time that I wanted to enjoy, watching a Marx Brothers movie would be pretty near the bottom of my list of things to do.
I remember watching a Marx Bros. movie or two with my brother when we were kids; out dad used to rent them for us. (Our dad was also a fan of the Three Stooges; I think it's just a result of growing up in a different era.) And I remember not being too impressed, but I'd always chalked that up to the fact that as a kid I basically rejected anything black and white. However, having recently seen two Marx Brothers films I can confidently say that I am just not a Marx Brothers fan.
That's not to say that there aren't things I find funny in their movies. When the entire dialogue of the movie consists of a flurry of zingers, odds are that one or two are going to hit the mark. However, too many of the jokes are just too dated; a lot of Groucho's jokes, in particular, have to do with women and ideas of womanhood that don't really resonate today. Also, a lot of the jokes use dated vocabulary; I don't mind this at all, really--in fact, I love it--but it usually means it takes a couple extra seconds to process what's being said. Given the fast-paced nature of Marx Bros. movies, you don't usually have the luxury of a few extra seconds.
Fortunately, there are plenty of sight gags and physical comedy to keep you occupied even if you don't get the one-liners. Unfortunately, most of that stuff isn't all that funny to me. Partly, this could be an effect of the success of the Marx Brothers. For instance, the famous mirror scene from Duck Soup, where Groucho and Harpo (in disguise as Groucho) mimic each other in various hilarious ways, has been replicated countless times. Most recently, I think I saw it on an episode of SNL. Also, the old "cut some dude's tie off" routine (which, for all I know, predates the Marx Brothers), pops up in The Wire, a Capital One commercial with Alec Baldwin, and countless other places I'm sure.
At least they knew how to keep movies short back then. At 92 minutes, A Night at the Opera practically feels like an epic. I think I fell asleep. I'm sure at some point I'll re-watch it, since I'll feel guilty about not liking it, but at least I won't waste too much time on it.
Groucho is some sort of charlatan who convinces a wealthy woman from some obscure, made-up European country ("Freedonia") to appoint him leader. Chico and Harpo are a duo of spies sent to infiltrate Groucho's government. They try to steal Freedonia's secret war plans, which results in Harpo dressed up in disguise as Groucho in his pajamas (complete with a pointy nightcap), sneaking around the lady's mansion. Eventually he runs into the real Groucho, and the mirror scene ensues. Later, they all go to war. Not that any of that really matters, it's just an excuse for jokes. There are songs, too. I liked this better than Opera, maybe because it's shorter, maybe because it's a little zanier.
Admittedly, I think I fell asleep at some point during this movie. The basic plot is that Groucho overhears someone talking about how much some famous opera singer is going to be paid, then he mistakenly signs a contract with a different singer, thinking he's the famous one. Chico plays the lesser singer's manager, and Harpo plays a "dresser," basically a costume assistant. The scene with the drafting of the contract is kind of funny, if a bit too long:
Somehow, they all end up on a steamer. There is a classic scene where dozens of people end up crammed into Groucho's cabin:
Eventually they do end up at the opera, and chaos ensues (you know, backdrops going up and down, people swinging from the rafters). That kind of comedy doesn't really do it for me. My recommendation is to watch a few clips on YouTube of the most famous scenes, and save yourself the trouble of watching the whole film.
I remember watching a Marx Bros. movie or two with my brother when we were kids; out dad used to rent them for us. (Our dad was also a fan of the Three Stooges; I think it's just a result of growing up in a different era.) And I remember not being too impressed, but I'd always chalked that up to the fact that as a kid I basically rejected anything black and white. However, having recently seen two Marx Brothers films I can confidently say that I am just not a Marx Brothers fan.
That's not to say that there aren't things I find funny in their movies. When the entire dialogue of the movie consists of a flurry of zingers, odds are that one or two are going to hit the mark. However, too many of the jokes are just too dated; a lot of Groucho's jokes, in particular, have to do with women and ideas of womanhood that don't really resonate today. Also, a lot of the jokes use dated vocabulary; I don't mind this at all, really--in fact, I love it--but it usually means it takes a couple extra seconds to process what's being said. Given the fast-paced nature of Marx Bros. movies, you don't usually have the luxury of a few extra seconds.
Fortunately, there are plenty of sight gags and physical comedy to keep you occupied even if you don't get the one-liners. Unfortunately, most of that stuff isn't all that funny to me. Partly, this could be an effect of the success of the Marx Brothers. For instance, the famous mirror scene from Duck Soup, where Groucho and Harpo (in disguise as Groucho) mimic each other in various hilarious ways, has been replicated countless times. Most recently, I think I saw it on an episode of SNL. Also, the old "cut some dude's tie off" routine (which, for all I know, predates the Marx Brothers), pops up in The Wire, a Capital One commercial with Alec Baldwin, and countless other places I'm sure.
At least they knew how to keep movies short back then. At 92 minutes, A Night at the Opera practically feels like an epic. I think I fell asleep. I'm sure at some point I'll re-watch it, since I'll feel guilty about not liking it, but at least I won't waste too much time on it.
Duck Soup (1933)
Terry's Grade: B-
A Night at the Opera (1935)
Terry's Grade: CAdmittedly, I think I fell asleep at some point during this movie. The basic plot is that Groucho overhears someone talking about how much some famous opera singer is going to be paid, then he mistakenly signs a contract with a different singer, thinking he's the famous one. Chico plays the lesser singer's manager, and Harpo plays a "dresser," basically a costume assistant. The scene with the drafting of the contract is kind of funny, if a bit too long:
Somehow, they all end up on a steamer. There is a classic scene where dozens of people end up crammed into Groucho's cabin:
Eventually they do end up at the opera, and chaos ensues (you know, backdrops going up and down, people swinging from the rafters). That kind of comedy doesn't really do it for me. My recommendation is to watch a few clips on YouTube of the most famous scenes, and save yourself the trouble of watching the whole film.
Sunday, January 8, 2012
Sunset Blvd. (1950)
Terry's Grade: B+
Well, here's another one for the "movies about movies" category. Lots of cameos in this one, most notably (to me) Cecil B. Demille and Buster Keaton. Both of those guys are really just names to me, but they're famous names.
Summary: Struggling Hollywood writer Joe Gillis (William Holden), while trying to evade the repo men who are after his car, stumbles onto the decrepit estate of aging, washed-up, yet still fantastically wealthy, silent-era actress Norma Desmond (Gloria Swanson). She hires him to help her edit a screenplay she's written (the story of Salome, the dancing-girl who was paid to murder by beheading John the Baptist). Norma is desperately lonely, so she uses all kinds of gifts and tricks (including a suicide attempt) to keep Joe around. Meanwhile, Joe starts falling in love with Betty (Nancy Olson), an aspiring writer who also happens to be his best friend's fiance. Through it all, there is Max von Mayerling (Eric von Stroheim), Norma's faithful servant and driver (and ex-director and ex-husband). Things don't really go well for anybody.
The opening scene reveals a lot about the ending of the movie, and it's one of those scenes that leaves me wondering how much the director expects his audience to grasp. My brain finally made the connection maybe about ten minutes after the scene, and I'd guess that while many other viewers also probably come to the same realization, many others probably don't. There are other movies where the ending is also revealed early in the film, but the director tries to obscure it to some degree. (I'm sorry if that paragraph is opaque, but I'm trying to avoid spoilers... I know, I know...)
Also, this being a movie about a forgotten silent-era movie star, there are connections to The Artist. Valentine is certainly partly inspired by Norma Desmond (watching her old movies alone in her house, as smoke wafts up into the light of the projector), but you could also make the connection between the butler/driver Max and James Cromwell's character in The Artist, as well as the two cars themselves. Also, in Sunset Blvd. they keep mentioning some guy named Valentino, which sounds a lot like The Artist's main character.
There's a bonus to watching the DVD rather than just streaming the movie online: the bonus features for Sunset Blvd. actually included a little (15-minute) retrospective, with interviews from various cast members and others. I've wished for that kind of thing on several other of the older, classic films we've watched recently, but surprisingly (or not?) many of those older films don't have any special features whatsoever. Without that special feature I never would have known that the actor who plays the butler/ex-husband/ex-director Max has such an epic name, Eric von Stroheim (well, I might have figured that much out), and that he himself was a former director, who had directed Gloria Swanson in her youth, and even directed the film Queen Kelly, whose footage we see in the scene where Desmond watches her old film. Or that Swanson's career at least somewhat mimicked that of her character in the film (although, if you're casting a 50-year-old Hollywood actress to play a 50-year-old Hollywood actress, there are inevitably going to be some similarities).
Ultimately, I can see why this is a classic movie. There are a few great shots (mainly the early shot from under the pool, which turns out to have actually been shot above the pool using a mirror), quality performances, and a classic story line. As I watched, I was imagining a remake starring Helen Mirren as the old actress and Ewan McGregor as the writer, although it might be that they're both too old for those roles at this point. But then I saw Glenn Close talking about how she'd only done "Sunset Blvd: The Musical" because it was a musical and it would be impossible to do a straight remake of the movie. That's definitely true; you can't remake classic movies. But when you have a classic story, you can remake it forever, and at the heart of Sunset Blvd. is a classic story. (Even within the movie, you have at least two classic stories referenced: Cecil B. Demille is in the process of filming "Sampson and Delilah", and Norma's script is the story of Salome, the famous beheader of John the Baptist, who has been endlessly painted.) Although she gets a lot of praise for her acting in this movie, I think Gloria Swanson goes just a little too overboard for my taste. That said, I really enjoyed watching this movie and I'm glad I did. It's even probably worth a re-watch after a year or so.
(On the word "gay"; Norma recalls to Cecil that the last time they met was at a "gay" place, meaning a dance club or a party or something like that. Just interesting that it's 11 years after the "gay" line in Bringing Up Baby, but still plenty early enough to use the word "gay" in the joyous sense without a second thought. Also, there's really no homosexual content in this movie, explicit or implicit, as far as I could tell, not that that's surprising.)
Summary: Struggling Hollywood writer Joe Gillis (William Holden), while trying to evade the repo men who are after his car, stumbles onto the decrepit estate of aging, washed-up, yet still fantastically wealthy, silent-era actress Norma Desmond (Gloria Swanson). She hires him to help her edit a screenplay she's written (the story of Salome, the dancing-girl who was paid to murder by beheading John the Baptist). Norma is desperately lonely, so she uses all kinds of gifts and tricks (including a suicide attempt) to keep Joe around. Meanwhile, Joe starts falling in love with Betty (Nancy Olson), an aspiring writer who also happens to be his best friend's fiance. Through it all, there is Max von Mayerling (Eric von Stroheim), Norma's faithful servant and driver (and ex-director and ex-husband). Things don't really go well for anybody.
The opening scene reveals a lot about the ending of the movie, and it's one of those scenes that leaves me wondering how much the director expects his audience to grasp. My brain finally made the connection maybe about ten minutes after the scene, and I'd guess that while many other viewers also probably come to the same realization, many others probably don't. There are other movies where the ending is also revealed early in the film, but the director tries to obscure it to some degree. (I'm sorry if that paragraph is opaque, but I'm trying to avoid spoilers... I know, I know...)
Also, this being a movie about a forgotten silent-era movie star, there are connections to The Artist. Valentine is certainly partly inspired by Norma Desmond (watching her old movies alone in her house, as smoke wafts up into the light of the projector), but you could also make the connection between the butler/driver Max and James Cromwell's character in The Artist, as well as the two cars themselves. Also, in Sunset Blvd. they keep mentioning some guy named Valentino, which sounds a lot like The Artist's main character.
There's a bonus to watching the DVD rather than just streaming the movie online: the bonus features for Sunset Blvd. actually included a little (15-minute) retrospective, with interviews from various cast members and others. I've wished for that kind of thing on several other of the older, classic films we've watched recently, but surprisingly (or not?) many of those older films don't have any special features whatsoever. Without that special feature I never would have known that the actor who plays the butler/ex-husband/ex-director Max has such an epic name, Eric von Stroheim (well, I might have figured that much out), and that he himself was a former director, who had directed Gloria Swanson in her youth, and even directed the film Queen Kelly, whose footage we see in the scene where Desmond watches her old film. Or that Swanson's career at least somewhat mimicked that of her character in the film (although, if you're casting a 50-year-old Hollywood actress to play a 50-year-old Hollywood actress, there are inevitably going to be some similarities).
Ultimately, I can see why this is a classic movie. There are a few great shots (mainly the early shot from under the pool, which turns out to have actually been shot above the pool using a mirror), quality performances, and a classic story line. As I watched, I was imagining a remake starring Helen Mirren as the old actress and Ewan McGregor as the writer, although it might be that they're both too old for those roles at this point. But then I saw Glenn Close talking about how she'd only done "Sunset Blvd: The Musical" because it was a musical and it would be impossible to do a straight remake of the movie. That's definitely true; you can't remake classic movies. But when you have a classic story, you can remake it forever, and at the heart of Sunset Blvd. is a classic story. (Even within the movie, you have at least two classic stories referenced: Cecil B. Demille is in the process of filming "Sampson and Delilah", and Norma's script is the story of Salome, the famous beheader of John the Baptist, who has been endlessly painted.) Although she gets a lot of praise for her acting in this movie, I think Gloria Swanson goes just a little too overboard for my taste. That said, I really enjoyed watching this movie and I'm glad I did. It's even probably worth a re-watch after a year or so.
(On the word "gay"; Norma recalls to Cecil that the last time they met was at a "gay" place, meaning a dance club or a party or something like that. Just interesting that it's 11 years after the "gay" line in Bringing Up Baby, but still plenty early enough to use the word "gay" in the joyous sense without a second thought. Also, there's really no homosexual content in this movie, explicit or implicit, as far as I could tell, not that that's surprising.)
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