Apr 16, 2015

Cannes competition lineup looks incredibly stacked this year!

“The Assassin” (dir. Hou Hsiao-Hsien)
“Carol” (dir. Todd Haynes)
“Dheepan” (dir. Jacques Audiard)
“The Lobster” (dir. Yorgos Lanthimos)
“Louder Than Bombs” (dir. Joachim Trier)
“Macbeth” (dir. Justin Kurzel)
“Marguerite et Julien” (dir. Valerie Donzelli)
“Mia Madre” (dir. Nanni Moretti)
“Mountains May Depart” (dir. Jia Zhangke)
“My King” (Maiwenn)
“Our Little Sister” (dir. Hirokazu Kore-eda)
"Sea Of Trees" (dir. Gus Van Sant)
"Sicario" (dir. Denis Villeneuve)
“A Simple Man” (dir. Stephane Brize)
“Son Of Saul” (dir. Laszlo Nemes)
“The Tale Of Tales” (dir. Matteo Garrone)
“Youth” (dir. Paolo Sorrentino)

http://blogs.indiewire.com/theplayl...ad-2015-cannes-film-festival-line-up-20150416

 

Mar 26, 2015

Any It Follows fans here? I put together some thots for HuffPost: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/andy-hoglund-/references-in-it-follows-set-the-tone_b_6933810.html

@Twan @Vahn @Dew @Woody @Bleed @Swizz @irbis @Old_Parr

 

Mar 20, 2015

New piece: http://cinematicessential.com/from-the-mean-to-the-unbreakable-examining-tina-fey-cinematic-method/

on Tina Fey, Mean Girls and her new show, Kimmy Schmidt

@Pinhead @Bleed @Dew @Koolo @Narsh @Old_Parr @Twan @Vahn

 

Jan 31, 2015

I would have watched her strut around in Armani outfits and a blonde wig and yell in a Brooklyn accent for hours.

We don't have to wait too long for the first reactions. Berlin starts in a week!

Here are the films on my radar for February (not too much):

February 13- Da Sweet Blood of Jesus (Spike Lee)
February 20- Wild Tales (Damian Szifron)
February 25-27- Wild Canaries (Lawrence Michael Levine), '71 (Yann Demange), Maps to the Stars (David Cronenberg)

 

Jan 24, 2015

Finally saw Mommy...it was dope! At the moment, I think I still like Laurence Anyways better, but this is pretty great as well. Dolan's style certainly isn't...austere so I could understand why some critics find his style excessive, but for me, it was hard not to be caught up in the film's raw energy. Tremendous performances from Anne Dorval and Suzanne Clement as well

 

Jan 21, 2015

Hmm, well...no. At least that's not what I took away from it. Wolf of Wall Street portrayed all the excess in an over-the-top, in-your-face manner, but I didn't read it as an endorsement of what happened. In fact, quite the opposite; when Jordan's downfall comes, it feels deserved and inevitable. If fratty douches got a boner over Jordan's lifestyle (and I'm aware that many of them did), it's a result of their own ignorance to the film's intent; I hardly think Scorsese wanted to paint him as a hero.

American Sniper is much less critical of its subject, and DOES glorify him. Eastwood's characterization is a much less three-dimensional one than Scorsese's, and the film more or less begins and ends with a whack-off-to-the-flag-cuz-troops-are-good type sentiment, abstaining from anything much more complex than that (aside from a few nuanced moments courtesy of Bradley Cooper).

I guess I would say that the criticisms of American Sniper's intentions are warranted, but my problems with the film go beyond that. I personally don't think WOWS is a good example of a double standard (although I'm sure you could find a different one).

 

Jan 17, 2015

Finally saw Boyhood.
The most touching film experience I've had in a long time, Boyhood excels in accurately capturing the experience of adolescence. And I know that sounds kind of obviously stupid - the name of the film tells you what to expect - but at the same time, I was taken off guard with how resonant this was. I think for me, the moment when I knew I was watching a masterpiece and not just a good movie with an interesting production gimmick was when we follow the main character at age 12/13 to a camp out at an under construction house with his friends and 2 older high school kids. And as I was watching it.. I couldn't help but feel this is exactly what that felt like. That feeling of admiration, fear, awkwardness, and disdain towards these older guys was captured so well that it instantly transported me back to that time in my life. It's the moments like that where you realize you're watching something special. Directed beautifully by Richard Lanklater, with excellent supporting turns by Patricia Arquette and Ethen Hawke as Mom and Dad. Arquette's role is a bit more overstated than Hawke's, but I think the subtlety of his performance is probably the best in the film. If I have one complaint, it's the main character's acting when he gets into his teenage years.. It's not bad per se, but his delivery becomes stilted in a way that sticks out around how natural everyone else sounds. It wasn't enough to take me out of the film, but I definitely noticed it.

If it's not the best film of 2014, it's really close.

 

Jan 15, 2015

To be honest, this is what bothers me about the voting. I want Boyhood to win, but this is because the film is much much more of an achievement than merely one of endurance and scale. Sure, the length of time added to its magic, its sincere presence of time and its passing, but the film's artistic and literary merit should be judged besides this.

While I'm already in a post, forget the last movies thread...

• 
  The Young Girls of Rochefort 1967
  ★★★★★ Rewatched 14 Jan, 2015
  
  Chance and serendipity mingle as visual choreography in Demy's final masterpiece, a French Singin' in the Rain.
  
  90/100 - Amazing
  (Criterion Bluray)
  
  
• 
  The Umbrellas of Cherbourg 1964
  ★★★★★ Rewatched 14 Jan, 2015
  
  Demy's rich mise en scene dazzles as the camera dances in long takes around the singing characters. Joy.
  
  90/100 - Amazing
  (Criterion Bluray)
  
  
• 
  Bay of Angels 1963
  ★★★★½ Watched 14 Jan, 2015
  
  Demy's poetry of chance made tangible in the spinning of a roulette wheel, the characters' path determined by whim.
  
  85/100 - Excellent
  (Criterion Bluray)
  
  
• 
  Inherent Vice 2014
  ★★★★ Watched 13 Jan, 2015
  
  Denotations of the self. Enter the rabbit hole. We are subject to the inherent confusions & delusions of a mind in excess.
  
  83/100 - Great
  (Cinema)
  
  
• 
  Selma 2014
  ★★★½ Watched 13 Jan, 2015
  
  An inspiring if formally unoriginal depiction of resilience and perseverance in face of the inhumane. Oyelowo is fantastic.
  
  74/100 - Good
  (Cinema)
  

 

Dec 26, 2014

Films I've Recently seen

Pinocchio (1940) 8/10
Bambi (1942) 8/10
The River (Jean Renoir, 1951) 6/10
Pitch Perfect (2012) 6/10
St. Vincent (2014) 7/10
The Babadook (2014) 7/10
Winter Sleep 8/10
The Equalizer (2014) 6/10
American Psycho (2000) 8/10
22 Jump Street 6.5/10
The Matrix 7.5/10
Wild Strawberries (Bergman, 1957) 9/10

 

Dec 24, 2014

Merry christmas, my fellow cinephiles, hope all of you have a good time

 

Dec 12, 2014

I saw Snowpiercer and Lucy -- as you can see, I'm plowing my way through 2014 as much as possible.

I loved Snowpiercer. I had so much fun with the film and its role as a parable also worked really well with me. The final stretch is great, as is the final shot of the film.

Lucy was also fun. Her and Under the Skin is the perfect double feature, but Lucy is a great midnight choice to that lineup. It's incredibly silly but its out-and-out action works well because of that conceit.

 

Dec 11, 2014

I saw The Strange Little Cat and Ida and really enjoyed both.

The locking of the camera in The Strange Little Cat works extremely well and its cutting of characters out of the frame places its focus on the details of daily life. I really admired its passage of time with minor montages that were emphasized with editing and choice of music. I found the youngest daughter simply adorable -- she's also an incredibly gifted performer.

Ida has some of the most beautiful cinematography of any film this year. David Lowery called the film a secret, "perfectly kept," which sums up the film quite well. The film balances a number of genres, buts its road film one didn't absorb me as much. I did, however, love the final stretch of the film and Ida's awakening as a young woman.

 

Dec 6, 2014

I've seen a bunch of films recently.

I've been working my way through some filmographies -- like I had said, I saw all of David Lynch's work as well as some of Steven Soderbergh's. These are some films I saw for the first time in the past two or three months.

O Brother, Where Art Thou?
All That Jazz
Stagecoach
Nightcrawler
Gone Girl
The Double
The Purge
The Purge: Anarchy
You’re Next
Being There
Contagion
Gray’s Anatomy
Bubble
And Everything Is Going Fine
Pickpocket
Dear Zachary: A Letter to a Son About His Father
Birdman
The Limey
Out of Sight
Waking Life
The Good German
Schizopolis
Primer
Mouchette
The Trial of Joan of Arc
Conducta
Elephant
The Color Wheel
Computer Chess
L’Argent
Blackfish
This Is Not a Film
Mommy
Interstellar
The Informant!
Maps to the Stars
Still Alice

 

Dec 4, 2014

Project V with Ryan Gosling: previews seen in the first scenes of the film by Terrence Malick

During "Le Giornate professionali del Cinema 2014" held in Sorrento (Italy) from 30 November to 6 Decemebr we saw some sequences of the film.
From the short footage, we can guess that Ryan Gosling will star, an aspiring rock star. Around him gravitate two characters, one played by Michael Fassbender, who seems to be a business partner of Gosling, someone with whom the character can realize his musical ambitions. On the other side there is the character of Rooney Mara, who in the first part of the footage is clearly Gosling's woman and then seems to weave a clandestine relationship with Fassbender.
Around this love triangle gravitate two other women, Natalie Portman, in a novel blonde who seems to get in the good graces of Fassbender, while Cate Blanchett weaves his way with that of the character of Gosling.
Project V seems to be, for the style, similar to Knight of Cups, but takes over the discourse on '"hardening" of the rhythms that the director seems to have put in place in the film starring Christian Bale. Malick is measured by the world of rock, and automatically the themes and rhythms change and adapt. However, what Malick does is never an adjustment subservient to history, but a slow transformation, gradual and apparently motivated by what appear an artistic reasons. The story seems to come back to become important, to the detriment of what had happened in a rather extreme in The Tree of Life.

http://www.cinefilos.it/cinema-news/2014b/project-v-ryan-gosling-terrence-malick-177645

omg!!!

 

Nov 30, 2014

i go away for months and the whole place has changed. i'm glad however to see familiar people

i need to catch up on tons and tons of films, and it doesn't look like i will be doing my best at that anytime soon. anyhow, here's what i thought about Interstellar:

Interstellar is a lesser exercise in reflection than the masterpieces in its genre, but it's a thrilling, emotional, intimate and unpredictable adventure. one that does not slow down its pace for a moment, which is unfortunate because it chooses to tiptoe on certain moments that could have easily enrich the experience by just letting them breathe for a while. the further the film progresses, the more we lose hope for a satisfying resolution. and accordingly, the very basic of human qualities; survival, the quest for knowledge, the will to remain true to one's principles, communication and longevity get tested.

perhaps the film's greatest strength to me is how it was able to take an idea so cheesy and poor, whichever way i look at it, that love between humans transcends dimensions and is the physical force to save the world.. running with it, and finally bring it home in the best imaginable way in the tesseract, ultimately making it a tour de force emotionally and visually.

despite its many scientific blunders and incompetent dialogue, i think the film means well overall. Interstellar refuses to be just another blockbuster, and dreams of being an epic adventure of grandiose ambition, putting man and his place in the universe in the heart of the intrigue. in its intentions of confronting man with his own mortality and existential legitimacy, there lies a sensible reflections on family and the perpetuation of our species.

Interstellar is frequently messy, often in a hurry and restless, occasionally silly and redundant, but substantiates a heartening reflection on love, death, hope and perseverance that somehow overweighs its poor tendencies. 8/10

 

Nov 23, 2014

saw interstellar and whiplash the other day. Thoughts on Interstellar: https://aestheticsofthemind.wordpress.com/2014/11/20/interstellar-nolan-2014/

Really impressed by Whiplash. It's up there with my favourites of the year.

(Real Hip Hop here, btw.)

 

Feb 24, 2021

Had no idea they pushed back Many Saints of Newark to September. Was looking forward to watching it on the pandemic anniversary

 

Apr 29, 2019

guys, i know this forum sucks... but try to keep this thread up at least lol @Twan r u there

 

Mar 19, 2019

Check out my new interview with Sasheer Zamata: https://snlpodcast.com/extras/2019/3/19/article-sasheer-zamata

 

Feb 25, 2019

Usually even when I don't agree with the academy's choices I understand some kind of dumb logic behind their picks. I'm just at a loss as to how anyone could've voted for Bohemian Rhapsody for Best Film Editing. That movie was an absolute clusterfuck of reaction shots and mid sentence cuts.

Green Book is perfectly adequate but completely unexceptional. The problematic elements are far from innocuous - tho I do think they're getting blown out of proportion - but even putting those aside, there's literally nothing about the movie that elevates it above a made-for-tv "racism is bad" special. Mahershala Ali is very good. Viggo Mortensen is fine, and everything else - the directing, cinematography, writing, music, etc., - is so shockingly par for the course that it's almost disgustingly bland.