cineaste sandbox

v psyched for it, imma drag some people over to see it i think. the last doc i saw was a partially unsubtitled mur murs, which I liked.

i love this Sukhdev Sandhu story about talking to AV, btw:

She spoke with a startling lack of sentimentality about the ever-more rapid migration of cinema from the big screen to the computer screen: “For me,” she said, “it is not a problem. If you watch a film on a laptop when you’re in bed, the film is closer to your heart. Sometimes you fall asleep. OK. Then you wake up and you do not know what is the film and what is your dream. This is perfect.”

Xmas has been a time for cinematic revolution in this room.

After finally watching Carlos before Xmas (5 hr versh, natch) I went ahead and got Chris Marker's Grin Without a Cat making it, with Varda, a Left-bank cinema club night. Apparently there is a four hour cut of this story (pretty much the only story in this year of protests upon protests) of the new left in the late 60s (Vietnam, Che's murder) right through to Chile.

This is the three hour cut, which Marker apparently re-jigged after the end of the Soviet Untion, but also tantalizingly before the new wave of protests this year, which seems to be saying that, well, some of cats have just about got away, survived, are about.

Maybe they've come back...might need another new ending...

The montage, the music (a brill electronic score), all put together as if a dream (or nightmare) that I will certainly never forget. One of the best things I've watched this year.

As Carlos and Grin... showed, the fighting was worldwide. So I turned to more local stories: Padatik by Mrinal Sen. Guerilla Fighter who bunks in posh flat for a couple of days while things 'cool down', from '71. At the end of it the increasingly impatient (oh youth!) protagonist is told to "be brave".

I watched Wakamatsu and Masao Adachi Declaration of War, filmed somewhere in Palestine after they got back from the lol Cannes Film Festival! Its a propaganda film, but not Eisenstein so its of limited appeal but some of the comments from a couple of revolutionaries in the film (people who gave it all up) are fascinating if you're watching all of this back-to-back. Wakamatsu made a doc about the J. Red Army which I've yet to see.

Also hunted down Sur by Fernando Solanas (he of 'Third Cinema' fame) and it reminded me of Travelling Players by Angelopolous. Just not as good, the main reason to watch are the shots of people in the foggy night of Buenos Aires, but the time jumbling is less effective, and the story does come down to the personal a bit much. The best bit was the soundtrack: mostly by Piazolla, but also a scene where Maria (whose hisband has been jailed by the military) goes out to a nightclub which appears to be a hub of Argentinian new wave. Bad haircuts are seen.

Watched and enjoyed "Hugo" (3D) tonight. Lovely way to spend a couple of hours. Scorsese is pretty terrible with the slapstick though, eh?

Some of us think he's pretty boring with the 3D, and with kids who aren't prostitutes or the Dalai Lama.

Pretty sure a lot of people also thought he was pretty boring with kids that are the Dalai Lama.

Thought Hugo was pretty boring with the sniffly-nose kid's giant head taking up the screen for an hour and a half. I liked seeing the Méliès films in 3d though.

caught 'margaret' the other day. a terrific mess.

works by Ford, Kuchar, Chaplin, Hawks, Pixar and the Nicholas Bros added to the National Film Registry:

http://mubi.com/notebook/posts/daily-briefing-25-titles-added-to-the-national-film-registry

I love the Kuchar short ('I, An Actress'), a fitting epitaph to throw in there. Short of his whole part at the end of 'Thundercrack!' I can't think of a better dialogue heavy bit to introduce someone to the spirit of Kuchar.

watched Sans Soleil last night

George Kuchar retro in NYC, Feb 10-12 (PDF, page 7):

http://anthologyfilmarchives.org/AFA123_2012CalCompletes.pdf

man, i've only seen a handful of those! jealous that y'all will see an actual print of 'eclipse of the sun virgin'

Tanaki - did u like Sans Soleil? It was my first Marker after La Jetee and I was really underwhelmed. Was a few years ago so I want to revisit.

Been screening a few African/Third world cinema films: Mambety's Hyenes and Cisse's Yeelen are really great, as is Pereira dos Santos' Rio, 40 Degrees.

Loved it — even more than La jetée

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HEWir5844nE

I guess this is the most applicable thread, although I'm not sure how cineaste it is: I finally found some time to finish posting a Facebook countdown of my favourite movies I did a few months ago onto my homepage.

http://phildellio.tripod.com/movies.html

(Be forewarned: James L. Brooks places more films than Carl T. Dreyer and Rainer W. Fassbinder combined.)

Clemenza, you're dead to me now. When you go over to our mother's house for New Year's Eve let me know ahead of time so I don't have to see you

I was just being strong for all of us the way Papa was.

Or watch Dinner For One with you

j/jk I just narrowly renewed my own Film Snob bona fides by going to see Marienbad and The Gold Rush at the FF last week

I've always felt like I've had a foot in both worlds. (Last two films at home: Prince of the City and L'Avventura. I think they're both overrated.) We had a lot of back and forth in the comments about the relationship between these kinds of lists and the official canon 9or whatever you want to call it0.

Shift up, shift down...

Which means that 2012 will be the Year of Apatow and Rogen for me

I've got Dreyer but no Fassbender or Brooks in my canon, as per Mubi:

ELECTROCUTING AN ELEPHANT (Edison, 1903)
M (Lang, 1931)
GOLD DIGGERS OF 1933 (LeRoy, 1933)
THE SCARLET EMPRESS (von Sternberg, 1934)
MAKE WAY FOR TOMORROW (McCarey, 1937)
HELLZAPOPPIN' (Potter, 1941)
FIREWORKS (Anger, 1947)
UN CHANT D'AMOUR (Genet, 1950)
GENTLEMEN PREFER BLONDES (Hawks, 1953)
THE NIGHT OF THE HUNTER (Laughton, 1955)
GERTRUD (Dreyer, 1964)
SIMON OF THE DESERT (Buñuel, 1965)
BREAKAWAY (Conner, 1966)
WHO'S AFRAID OF VIRGINIA WOOLF? (Nichols, 1966)
WEEKEND (Godard, 1967)
NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD (Romero, 1968)
BEYOND THE VALLEY OF THE DOLLS (Meyer, 1970)
PINK NARCISSUS (Bidgood, 1971)
WOMEN IN REVOLT (Morrissey, 1971)
THE WICKER MAN (Hardy, 1973)
FEMALE TROUBLE (Waters, 1974)
SCORE (Metzger, 1974)
THE TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE (Hooper, 1974)
BARRY LYNDON (Kubrick, 1975)
NASHVILLE (Altman, 1975)
CARRIE (De Palma, 1976)
GREY GARDENS (Maysles, Mayles, Hovde, 1976)
THE TENANT (Polanski, 1976)
ALL THAT JAZZ (Fosse, 1979)
THE WARRIORS (Hill, 1979)
MOMMIE DEAREST (Perry, 1981)
MS. 45 (Ferrara, 1981)
TANGO (Rybczynski, 1981)
TENEBRAE (Argento, 1982)
SANS SOLEIL (Marker, 1983)
SLEEPAWAY CAMP (Hiltzik, 1983)
CRIME WAVE (Paizs, 1985)
DO THE RIGHT THING (Lee, 1989)
PARIS IS BURNING (Livingston, 1990)
SÁTÁNTANGÓ (Tarr, 1994)
SHOWGIRLS (Verhoeven, 1995)
DOGVILLE (von Trier, 2003)
MUNICH (Spielberg, 2005)
INLAND EMPIRE (Lynch, 2006)
THE TREE OF LIFE (Malick, 2011)

Criterion shared part of their New Year's cartoon today on fb. Look forward to Weekend, Quadrophenia, and Harold & Maude amongst others.

Have you ever read Hoberman & Rosenbaum's Midnight Movies, Eric? Excellent book--it came to mind when I looked at your list. A friend of mine once listed Crime Wave as one of his ten favourite films. Haven't seen it.

Yep. Pretty great tho could've benefitted from a more humorous approach.