SCFZ

twodeadmagpies wrote: ↑Tue Sep 03, 2019 9:44 pm naked sweaty torsos.

McLaglen does NST pretty well, that was the one thing I took away from Gunga Din.

Under Pressure goes onto my watchlist; I haven't come up with nearly as many prospects for this year as usual.

There's also a Whale without sf/horror content for the year, called Remember The Night; that one's on my list as well.

VOTE 1 ANNIE OAKLEY


Or pay the consequences...

greg x wrote: ↑Tue Sep 03, 2019 6:19 am

Magnificent Obsession (The better one)
ha i'll have to find this too

i've just started stahl's mag obs and i already agree w/this viewpoint. it was one of my first sirks and it almost put me off him. and like others i think stahl got a bad break. his films are highly watchable. it isn't his fault the most gifted post-war hollywood director remade them. irene dunne has grown into a favorite and, while robert taylor isn't likely to, this role suits him. i want to compare imitation of life too (stahl's was nominated for best picture!). thx for mentioning it greg i'll have a double feature with girl from the marsh croft! (i've seen the sjostrom too)

Ruggles of Red Gap (Leo McCarey)

Sazen Tange and the Pot Worth a Million Ryo (Sadao Yamanaka)
Okoto and Sasuke (Yasujiro Shimazu)
Poppies (Kenji Mizoguchi)
The 39 Steps (Alfred Hitchcock)
Happiness (Aleksander Madvedkin)
Amphitryon - Happiness From The Clouds (Reinhold Schünzel)
The Band Concert (Wilfred Jackson)
Les Berceaux (Dimitri Kirsanoff)
Bride of Frankenstein (James Whale)
A Color Box (Len Lye)
Polychrome Fantasy (Norman McLaren)
She Married Her Boss (Gregory La Cava)
Devdas (P.C. Barua)
A Hero of Tokyo (Hiroshi Shimizu)
Peter Ibbetson (Henry Hathaway) (note: Kevin B. Lee has a good video essay on this film here: https://vimeo.com/23921367)

pabs wrote: ↑Tue Sep 03, 2019 6:53 am Speaking of Whale, who's seen Gods and Monsters (1998), a biopic of James Whale, played by Ian McKellen?

I saw it some years ago and recall it being better than expected, but still not really something I'd recommend.

irene dunne has grown into a favorite and, while robert taylor isn't likely to, this role suits him. i want to compare imitation of life too (stahl's was nominated for best picture!).

I'm not much for Taylor in general, but he can be really effective when cast as someone vapid or, well, blind to events around him. I don't necessarily mean Taylor himself is vapid, just that the emotional range he tends to exhibit is pretty basic, moving from genial to stern or confused, but without much sense of a lived history behind anything. He reads as if he exists in the moment without much sense of depth to his characters, which is pretty much what Magnificent Obsession needs for most of the movie.

I think Stahl's Imitation of Life is also quite good, but even more limited than Sirk's due to the era. Sirk can go much farther with the story than Stahl could, which suits both of them pretty well since Stahl's version is the less ornate and more grounded in tone. That doesn't of course mean it isn't problematic by today's standards.

I'm going with Ptushko's The New Gulliver to start with for '35 films. I'm a sucker for Soviet dialectic fantasy films. I prefer Rou to Ptushko a little in that department so far, but Ptushko's pretty good too.

arkheia wrote: ↑Thu Sep 05, 2019 1:39 am

pabs wrote: ↑Tue Sep 03, 2019 6:53 am Speaking of Whale, who's seen Gods and Monsters (1998), a biopic of James Whale, played by Ian McKellen?

I saw it some years ago and recall it being better than expected, but still not really something I'd recommend.

Yeah, def. not something worth writing home about, but it might interest a few people who'd like to know a bit about James Whale, and I've sometimes enjoyed throwing in a biopic or a doco of/on a Hollywood figure in my viewing schedule as an accompaniment/bonus-feature to a real film they were in, or worked on, as in these year-polls.

Peter Ibbetson is shot so well, and has such a great and well-handled core concept - but the rest (i.e. story) fell flat for me. Really wanted to love it.

David Thomson, from "Have You Seen...?"

karl wrote: ↑Wed Sep 04, 2019 12:44 am Chenal's Crime and Punishment: Pickpocket aside, the best adaptation of this book I've seen.

I've been looking for this version for YEARS to no avail!!

The Steel Animal (Willy Zielke) - A curious film. A combination of experimental montage sequences of trains, hokey historical reenactments and homoerotic scenes of bare-chested railworkers bonding and caressing steel rails.

The film's distribution was stopped by the Production company, July 1935, as the Reich's Railway Service was upset with the emphasis given to the history of railways (namely, French and British inventors), and aesthetic options - fast rhythm, superimposed images, and one spinning-wheel camera effect judged detrimental to railway customers; parallel of the Engineer's love for the machine and the sexual act, after a scene in which the pieces of equipment are detailed in terms of the human body. Despite Leni Riefenstahl, who liked the film very much, convinced Joseph Goebbels to view the film in a private screening, in October 1935, the Reich's Minister for Propaganda did not change the ban, writing in his diary that it was a bad film, which had caused too much stir.

Leni Riefenstahl discovered Zielke's talents watching "Das Stahltier" and hired him for her Olympia-project. Zielke was not favored by the Nazis, "Das Stahltier" was never shown in the cinemas - and he also had problems working together with Riefenstahl. In 1937 he was brought into a sanatorium and sterilized. In 1942 Riefenstahl needed a cameraman for "Tiefland" and made sure Zielke was set free again. Zielke recieved 5000 Deutsche Mark (about 2500 Euro) as a compensation for the forced sterilization in 1987 and died two years later.

pabs wrote: ↑Thu Sep 05, 2019 3:15 pm

karl wrote: ↑Wed Sep 04, 2019 12:44 am Chenal's Crime and Punishment: Pickpocket aside, the best adaptation of this book I've seen.

I've been looking for this version for YEARS to no avail!!

it's on kg and so are you. ?

Thanks!

greennui wrote: ↑Thu Sep 05, 2019 3:45 pm The Steel Animal (Willy Zielke) - A curious film. A combination of experimental montage sequences of trains, hokey historical reenactments and homoerotic scenes of bare-chested railworkers bonding and caressing steel rails.

Curiosity thoroughly piqued !

Evelyn wrote: ↑Thu Sep 05, 2019 5:05 pm

greennui wrote: ↑Thu Sep 05, 2019 3:45 pm The Steel Animal (Willy Zielke) - A curious film. A combination of experimental montage sequences of trains, hokey historical reenactments and homoerotic scenes of bare-chested railworkers bonding and caressing steel rails.

Curiosity thoroughly piqued !

Me TOO FOR THE LOVE OF GOD SOMEONE HELP ME SEE THIS

thanks

twodeadmagpies wrote: ↑Thu Sep 05, 2019 5:09 pm

Evelyn wrote: ↑Thu Sep 05, 2019 5:05 pm

greennui wrote: ↑Thu Sep 05, 2019 3:45 pm The Steel Animal (Willy Zielke) - A curious film. A combination of experimental montage sequences of trains, hokey historical reenactments and homoerotic scenes of bare-chested railworkers bonding and caressing steel rails.

Curiosity thoroughly piqued !

Me TOO FOR THE LOVE OF GOD SOMEONE HELP ME SEE THIS

thanks

Resources!

a thousand thanks ♥

rischka wrote: ↑Wed Sep 04, 2019 11:24 pm i'll have a double feature with girl from the marsh croft! (i've seen the sjostrom too)

and fittingly it's better than the sjostrom (which tbf was made in 1917). heartbreaking story that couldn't be made in hollywood then. sirk was a women's director from the beginning. this one may get into my list. it's quite affecting thx sally ♥

pabs wrote: ↑Thu Sep 05, 2019 4:26 pmThanks!

Resources!

!!

Novyy Gulliver / The New Gulliver (1935, Aleksandr Ptushko)

Was already at the top of my radar during my current animation fixation, but bumped it to first once greg mentioned it for 1935. Available on YouTube with English subs here.

lb review:
Very weird, often astonishing piece of Soviet propaganda. The opening montage makes me want to check out some of Ptushko's live-action works. Somehow equally endearing as it is irritating, but its main draw is the technical and artistic stop-motion brilliance which Ptushko apparently toiled over for three years, most remarkable in the minutia of a figurine pouring something from a tiny bottle or in the mouth movements of an opera singer reaching her vocal climax. What Ptushko put into motion here laid the groundwork for a slew of animators such as Rankin and Bass. The film didn't fully win me over however, as its historical significance outshines its quality of entertainment or storytelling, both of which left me cold. More of a film I'd cite in the context of the evolution of animation than something I'd like to watch again.

The opening montage makes me want to check out some of Ptushko's live-action works.

Of the few I've seen so far, Scarlet Sails is my favorite, but that's as much for the story as the filmmaking since it is a fairy tale that denies the need for magic to achieve the desired end, suggesting fantasy itself is something of a bourgeois concept that is rendered irrelevant by social striving for betterment. It keeps the structure of the fairy tale, but makes the outcome one that is earned through purposeful effort following the right set of ideals instead of wish fulfillment alone.

The Stone Flower is maybe a little more, well, flowery in terms of the filmmaking alone and allows some greater sense of the fantastic, while still keeping it rooted in effort instead of magic alone.

Soviet fantasies are so interesting for their rejection of the "Disney" ideals, which is appealing in some ways for how it criticizes the capitalist mindset, but at the same time is also interesting for how they worked to support the Soviet system in ways similar to how Disney supports capitalism, to not much better ends. The movies evoke a strong sense of what's missing in the more common fantasies of the west, but that's as much in seeing them from the perspective of that culture, where within the Soviet culture the thing that might be felt as missing may very well be what some of the more individualist nature of capitalism provides.

I watched Alice Adams last night and loved it. I don't agree with Thomson's criticism. I think she's a likeable character throughout, as her snooty-ness is wafer-thin and simply an obvious attempt to cover up her feelings of insecurity and social inferiority. Hedda Hopper as the arrogant Mrs Palmer, the snarling mother of Alice's nemesis, is great in a very brief scene pouring scorn on the whole Adams clan, as is the actor who plays her daughter, who it turns out is not a completely bad person herself, so quite a subtle performance there, too.

7.5

David Thomson, from "Have You Seen...?"

pabs wrote: ↑Fri Sep 06, 2019 7:29 am I watched Alice Adams last night and loved it. I don't agree with Thomson's criticism. I think she's a likeable character throughout, as her snooty-ness is wafer-thin and simply an obvious attempt to cover up her feelings of insecurity and social inferiority. Hedda Hopper as the arrogant Mrs Palmer, the snarling mother of Alice's nemesis, is great in a very brief scene pouring scorn on the whole Adams clan, as is the actor who plays her daughter, who it turns out is not a completely bad person herself, so quite a subtle performance there, too.

7.5

the character of alice's brother kills me every time. also the maid!

the character of alice's brother kills me every time

That's the thing that sort of works against the larger arc of the movie for me, Walter is just so much more genuine and unconcerned about maintaining class boundaries from the beginning that it sets Alice's striving in something of a less complimentary light. Walter of course has his problems, the gambling debt that leads to embezzlement could be claimed as a like or worse sort of attempt to crash through class barriers, but gambling is a different sort of problem than that and Walter's ease with blacks he gambles with and lack of concern over niceties doesn't feel like he's all that concerned with class. The problems then are mostly shown as artificial ones created by Alice as even Virgil's boss shows values that work against a class based critique of the family's problems, suggesting they'd have been better off just staying as they were and not trying to improve their station. Alice seems not to really see the various elements all that clearly and her mother is shown as hopelessly misguided. That, as is common for Hollywood, makes women the problem as men better know their station and don't rock the boat.

good points greg!

Thanks! I don't want to go too far though since it is a good role for Hepburn and there is some hints to why she might be seeking someone out of her class for legitimate reasons, as it does read like her character would feel as out of place within her class as she reads as out of place above her class. Wanting an educated man and seeking better options for one's own life are entirely reasonable things to desire, it's only that her story is framed by her mother's more reckless desires that makes the movie seem agenda bound..

pabs wrote: ↑Tue Sep 03, 2019 6:53 am Speaking of Whale, who's seen Gods and Monsters (1998), a biopic of James Whale, played by Ian McKellen?

Seen it. Not a biopic of Whale, a foolish self-pitying puling fantasy that diminishes Whale into a pathetic old fossil who dies to help a young straight guy get his life together. Disliked it pretty thoroughly. Rubbish.

Roscoe wrote: ↑Fri Sep 06, 2019 1:07 pm

pabs wrote: ↑Tue Sep 03, 2019 6:53 am Speaking of Whale, who's seen Gods and Monsters (1998), a biopic of James Whale, played by Ian McKellen?

Seen it. Not a biopic of Whale, a foolish self-pitying puling fantasy that diminishes Whale into a pathetic old fossil who dies to help a young straight guy get his life together. Disliked it pretty thoroughly. Rubbish.

Admittedly, you're able to see things from a different, wiser, knowing angle. I wonder if McKellen also regretted his involvement afterwards?

The Informer (Ford)
The Bride Of Frankenstein (Whale)
A Night At The Opera (Wood)
Who Killed Cock Robin? (David Hand)
An Inn In Tokyo (Ozu)
Ruggles of Red Gap (McCarey)
The Band Concert (Wilfred Jackson)
A Color Box (Len Lye)
My Green Fedora (Freleng)
Mad Love (Freund)
The Devil Is a Woman (Josef von Sternberg)

A first go. We'll see. MAD LOVE might give way to 39 STEPS. Not sure about DEVIL IS A WOMAN, it's gorgeous and all but the Breen Office cuts really screw the film up. I wish I was more enthusiastic about 39 STEPS, though. And RUGGLES OF RED GAP is maybe a little too clear in implying that Life Liberty And The Pursuit Of Happiness is really only intended to apply to White People.