What's the last movie you've seen?

[Gustaf]

Mulholland Dr.

A very aesthetic and artsy thriller/horror, abeit one without a clear plot. What remains of the plot moves slowly at times and it is too long. I would say overrated, but the originality aspect was certainly intruiging.

It does have a fairly clear plot. Ok, not exactly clear, but there is a story there (about the girl murdering her lesbian lover out of jealousy and then trying to run away from the fact by making up some fantasy).

Source?

... Ah, I have just read an explanation on the internet that fits it together... for the most part.

I will confess that that particular twist was hard for me to see because I was more involved in the plotline and attracted to the characters in the 'dream' plot myself!

I was actually quite proud of "getting" that plot. I'm usually not super-great with these things and most Lynch movies are completely incomprehensible (like Inland Empire) but this one I actually had pretty much in the bag at the end of it.

[Gustaf]

Seeing There Will Be Blood is one of the first things I plan to do after moving to Minneapolis.

For me: Storytelling. I actually liked this one more than Happiness, which most people don't. The plot setup was kind of weird though, what's the point of two completely unrelated stories just back to back?

Storytelling and Happiness are about equal to me. My favourite part of the first is when the jewish mom calls them all Holocaust survivors. In the second I've seldom laughed so hard like when the fat woman says "I'm a very passionate woman" while gulping down a huge pile of ice-cream and telling how she's killed and cut up some guy.

And of course, one cannot beat the exchange
"I'm not laughing AT you, I'm laughing WITH you"
"...but I'm not laughing"

Oh, and There Will Be Blood is a movie I'm really excited about.

[Gustaf]

The whole point of NCFOM (and if you haven't seen it yet and don't want to read any spoilers don't read any further) isn't about the drug money or even Chigurgh but rather Tommy Lee Jones's character deciding to retire. The story is his basically just his view of the incident that finally did it, he doesn't play a huge role in the actual story but that's not really the point. After viewing the true evil in Chigurgh he comes to the conclusion that the world has developed so far into evil and wickedness that it's not worth fighting for anymore, basically what the title means (No World For Old Men would probably be more accurate though I understand it's taken from a poem or something). That sounds like a nihilistic viewpoint to me. Oh and it's violent and bloody. Just not as cartoonish as Sin City.

You know a paper comparing the meaning of the endings of NCFOM and Se7en would be something really interesting to write for a film class or something. Similar themes but completely different conclusions (and endings too in the characters in question, Tommy Lee Jones in NCFOM and Morgan Freeman in Se7en)

It doesn't glorify violence and it also doesn't agree with the violent characters.

[Gustaf]

What the hell is the big deal with Atonement? Looks like a chick flick to me. I'd rather go to 27 Dresses than that, at least it might be funny.

Atonement is both A. a chick flick, and B. not a comedy.  Really, really not a comedy (though there are a few funny moments in it).  Without giving too much away, it's about a girl who had her sister's boyfriend arrested and shipped off to war under false pretenses coming to terms with what she did.  So, yeah, you probably wouldn't like it.

It's a great movie.

I also really liked Atonement.

[Gustaf]

The whole point of NCFOM (and if you haven't seen it yet and don't want to read any spoilers don't read any further) isn't about the drug money or even Chigurgh but rather Tommy Lee Jones's character deciding to retire. The story is his basically just his view of the incident that finally did it, he doesn't play a huge role in the actual story but that's not really the point. After viewing the true evil in Chigurgh he comes to the conclusion that the world has developed so far into evil and wickedness that it's not worth fighting for anymore, basically what the title means (No World For Old Men would probably be more accurate though I understand it's taken from a poem or something). That sounds like a nihilistic viewpoint to me. Oh and it's violent and bloody. Just not as cartoonish as Sin City.

You know a paper comparing the meaning of the endings of NCFOM and Se7en would be something really interesting to write for a film class or something. Similar themes but completely different conclusions (and endings too in the characters in question, Tommy Lee Jones in NCFOM and Morgan Freeman in Se7en)

It doesn't glorify violence and it also doesn't agree with the violent characters.

Man you and Gully are really just whiny Joe Lieberman-clones.

Eh...if you're "accusing" me of wanting to prohibit violence in movies, you may want to know that I don't.

[Gustaf]

There Will Be Blood. Very cool movie.

[Gustaf]

I wanna watch Teeth.

[Gustaf]

A History of Violence.

An interesting combination of a troubled family drama and an action movie that still does both very well.

That's one film I didn't really like for some reason. I actually preferred Eastern Promises, unlike most critics.

[Gustaf]

L'Année dernière à Marienbad

That's where they play that game with matches, isn't it? I've been wanting to watch that for a long time...

[Gustaf]

L'Année dernière à Marienbad

That's where they play that game with matches, isn't it? I've been wanting to watch that for a long time...

It is indeed. A very odd and open-ended film. I was pleased to discover according to imdb that some of my ideas about the meaning of the film had been suggested at the behest of Resnais by a French critic in the 1960s.

I would definittely recommend it.

Have you seen Hiroshima Mon Amour? That's also Resnais (the only of his films that I've seen). Definitely very strange, but I sort of liked it. He seems like an interesting director.

[Gustaf]

Wow, I missed the longest high-brow film discussion ever to take place on here.

Blackmail surprised me, actually. Given how early it was and so on, it was surprisingly good to me. I really enjoyed it. Otherwise, Hitchcock is a mixed bag for me. While he was undoubtedly a genius in some respects I tend to find some flaws in other departments.

[Gustaf]

The History Boys

Lovely and Depressing. I will watch it again, i'm sure; I just don't feel like doing it to myself yet

The next movies on the list are: Dig, Partition, White Chicks, The Phantom Tollbooth, Idiocracy, Saturday Night Fever, The Benchwarmers, Candy, The Band's Visit, The Prestige, Kokoda, Blades of Glory, Shrek 3, The Illustionist and The Producers.  Any ideas about which order?

Just...don't...watch...any...of...them...

[Gustaf]

The History Boys

Lovely and Depressing. I will watch it again, i'm sure; I just don't feel like doing it to myself yet

The next movies on the list are: Dig, Partition, White Chicks, The Phantom Tollbooth, Idiocracy, Saturday Night Fever, The Benchwarmers, Candy, The Band's Visit, The Prestige, Kokoda, Blades of Glory, Shrek 3, The Illustionist and The Producers.  Any ideas about which order?

Just...don't...watch...any...of...them...

Those magician movies (The Illusionist and The Prestige) aren't bad.

So I've heard. But in the overall context, still not good enough to get the entire list up to watchworthyness.

[Gustaf]

The History Boys

Lovely and Depressing. I will watch it again, i'm sure; I just don't feel like doing it to myself yet

The next movies on the list are: Dig, Partition, White Chicks, The Phantom Tollbooth, Idiocracy, Saturday Night Fever, The Benchwarmers, Candy, The Band's Visit, The Prestige, Kokoda, Blades of Glory, Shrek 3, The Illustionist and The Producers.  Any ideas about which order?

Just...don't...watch...any...of...them...

Those magician movies (The Illusionist and The Prestige) aren't bad.

So I've heard. But in the overall context, still not good enough to get the entire list up to watchworthyness.

Of the ones he mentioned I've seen The Illusionist, Shrek 3 and Blades of Glory. Thankfully I didn't have to pay to see the last. The Illusionist was certainly watchable and understandably so; it DOES have Ed Norton in it. Shrek 3 was poor and Blades of Glory was just plain painful.

EDIT: Just remembered a quick question: Gus have you seen You, the Living? I've heard good things and I was just wondering if you'd like to voice an opinion.

No, sadly I haven't. I wanted to see it but then I couldn't convince anyone to go and I didn't have the time and so on...I've seen some of Roy Andersson's work though. I will be getting back to this interesting topic later but sadly have to run out right now!

[Gustaf]

*groan*  what happened to my lengthy post on Roy Andersson? I must have misposted in some way...

[Gustaf]

This has slipped down so I thought I'd resurrect it with my most recently watched films:

Three Colours: Blue
Badlands
Three Colours: White
Casablanca
The Seventh Seal
The Thin Red Line

Greatly enjoyed all of them and some absolutely stunning cinematography on offer, particularly from Malick and Kiéslowski's films. I don't know how Saving Private Ryan beat out The Thin Red line for that Academy Award.

Some pretty good films there. Haven't seen Badlands yet and found The Thin Red Line a tad overrated actually.

Now, about "Du, Levande" since I'm not sure what happened to my reply about that...Roy Andersson is a very unorthodox filmmaker. He wants to make films about rooms or environments rather than people. This means that most of his later films (though of course he's spectacularly unproductive, having made, I think, a grand total of 4 films throughout his career - breakthrough movie En Kärlekshistoria, the only one I've seen, pretty good, Gilliap, a commercial flop which ended his career for 20 years, Sånger från andra våningen, which won the Jury Prize at Cannes, IIRC, and this last one) break completely with traditional narrative styles. They're basically collections of a large number of episodes with different characters. It seems you're a real cineast though so I think you should check it out. If you can handle Resnais, you can handle this. The comedy of the Scanian dialects will be hard to understand for a foreigner though.

[Gustaf]

Well hopefully the arts theatre opposite my college at university will be showing it on my return.

Interested to hear you though Thin Red Line was overrated; I think it is absolutely stunning visually and for me really goes a long way towards emphasising the transience of our existence. I definitely prefer it to Saving Private Ryan which came out the same year. I have to say, I think Spielberg is a bit overrated (although shock horror I haven't seen Schindler's List).

Anyway, I'd hope to be at least a bit of a cineast, I'd very much like to work in the industry and am planning to apply to film schools after university: Director/Writer works for me!

Saving Private Ryan I can't speak for, but you're probably right. Not a big Spielberg fan myself either. It's possible I wasn't quite in the mood for TRL at the time...might have to rewatch it.

I try to be somewhat cineastic myself, it's an excellent art form.

[Gustaf]

Storytelling

So how would you rank the Solondz movies?

I'd say:

Welcome to the Dollhouse
Storytelling
Happiness
(still haven't seen Palindromes)

I'm quite in the minority in liking Storytelling more than Happiness it seems. I think its narrative fits Solondz's style more though.

I've only seen Storytelling and Happiness. I think I lean towards liking Storytelling more too, actually. But I really enjoyed both. My favourite in Storytelling is when the mothers claims that they're Holocaust survivors and in Happiness when the big woman is eating ice cream and explains her murder by saying "I'm a very passionate woman". Not sure why that was so funny, but it was...

[Gustaf]

Scarlet Street (1945) by Fritz Lang. Very good actually, but depressing.

[Gustaf]

(though I haven't seen Cars).

That certainly wouldn't be the weak link in the studio's work, if anything is.

Really?  I thought the plot was almost painfully standard.  The others were at least a little less predictable.  I saw Cars as the stereotypical Disney movie but with cars.

Yeah, I thought Cars was the worse Pixar movie.

[Gustaf]

Sideways.

A bit overrated (maybe you have to be a wine afiacondo to REALLY love it), but I did enjoy it. Certainly great performances from Paul Giamatti and Thomas Hayden Church.

I agree completely.

[Gustaf]

Wall-E, at the cinema. I liked it, pretty cute film. Though the short film was even better.

[Gustaf]

Lindsay Anderson If....

Fantastic, we need more old-timey British "public school" (that's a private school for most here) movies.

Interesting film, indeed.

[Gustaf]

Saw V

This can be interpreted in two different ways.

Requiem for a Dream makes one feel pretty badly. At the same time, I felt it was a little too dark, with too little hope for me to be touched THAT deeply. I get numbed by those kind of stories. Also, the characters are a little too, I don't know, stupid? They don't seem to realize what they're doing with their lives. I was actually most touched by the old woman. She seemed to be more of a normal person to begin with and her life was destroyed in such a strange way.

[Gustaf]

The Brothers Bloom. I liked it. Funny entertainment, and conman movies is an underrated genre. I also saw the Sting recently, at home.