The Criterion Project

Swanshead Revisted

2011-02-21T16:50:00.000-05:00

A month or so ago I may have lightly sprinkled some hate flakes on the Black Swan. Well last Friday I went to see the New York City Ballet performance of Swan Lake at Lincoln Center and I must say that an apology is in order.

Black Swan totally influenced my experience. In my mind every swan (there are about 21 of them) had Natalie Portman's face and I was okay with that. I enjoyed projecting a troubled home life as the white swan danced around. Oh man, when THE BLACK SWAN made her entrance! I was so AMPED!! It was like that daymare I can make myself have where the psychotic rotten tomato reveals its true colors and the rock music comes on and I know I'm just effed.

I have no idea why Black Swan wasn't nominated for Best Writing (Original Screenplay). 23% of the ballet consists of the swans onstage (which btw are the best parts by far). The rest is about raucous divertissements (which, you might have guessed, are not the best parts).

Black Swan, I'm sorry.

Someone needs a hug

2011-01-17T13:05:00.000-05:00

To understand the above photo is to understand Blue Valentine. First off, Gosling is an extremely handsome man. That's more of a general observation, but I'm just setting the tone here. Next, the vantage of this picture is intimate, it's mad close, it violates Gosling's personal space. We are, one could say, 'in his shit'. Well the whole movie takes place within Ryan and Michelle's 'shit'. Now, finally, look again at Ry Ry. Beyond the beauty, if you can. Notice how he's looking at something he knows may not be in his best interest but keeps looking at because it's pretty damn gripping and the casting is so good?
If this movie doesn't move you then congratulations, you are the living dead.

'Psst. What the #$#@ is going on?'

2011-01-09T12:19:00.004-05:00

Lex and I have never been more confused by what we were watching than with The Leopard (now showing at Film Forum). We failed to grasp simple facts such as where, when, who, why, oh and also what. Compounding this in a horrific manner was the row behind us who literally laughed at anything said by anyone. And I'm pretty sure this movie isn't a comedy. And no, they weren't high. And yes, their laughs were unbearable. They were like cough laughs. Laugh coughs. Right in our ear. Cough laughing.

Two hours in and another to go the house lights came on by accident. This was our cue to leave and so we did. We later learned that the last 45 minutes are sublime and the reason the movie is so beloved by all.

Somewhere some-meow

2010-12-27T11:37:00.003-05:00

After working in the marketing world for over four years I can say without hesitation (no hes) that the most effective marketing tool out there today is the movie trailer.

Behold, the evocative and captivating trailer for Sofia Coppola's new dog turd of a movie, Somewhere:

How VISUAL and INTERESTING was that? And Casablancas straight up doing his thing! (He should literally get a percentage of ticket sales) And even the sound editing; the 'Hey Dad/Hi Cleo' exchange-- it sounds so CRISP. This trailer is PERSUASIVE!

Now, if I had a bootleg version of the actual movie I'd paste it below and say something like 'Behold, the new dog turd of a movie, Somewhere' and I wouldn't really have to say anything else because it would be clear to you how nothing was added in those ADDITIONAL 95 MINUTES. Though I would probably also incorporate a picture of Garfield the cat because Sofia is so lazyyyy.

Blame it on the...

2010-12-23T20:27:00.006-05:00

I think we're all pretty aware of the phenomenon that is high expectations. For example, if I believe for whatever reason that Jamie Foxx's new album, 'Best Night of My Life' will be sick as hell, I am creating a premature level of quality for the star of the 'Jamie Foxx Show' to achieve sonically, setting up the actual experience of popping BNOML into my computer and letting the crooning begin for failure. Whether Jamie likes it or not, I will be listening to his new full-length LP through a lens of 'this is gonna be some good ish' and if it's not then I will think of him merely as an actor-slash-actor.

Now, to be clear, I'm not referring what's commonly known as 'Hype' which has more to do with external excitement and expectations. No, high expectations is about the internal. I am partial to Jamie Foxx as a human being and am irrationally pinning my love for the Academy Award winning actor to his musical talent.

I had high expectations for Black Swan for a few reasons:

I'm interested in anything Darren Aronofsky does.
I read The Black Swan ealier this year and kinda jived with what the dude was saying (note: they are COMPLETELY unrelated).
My friends who had seen it already said they had to decompress afterward because it was so intense.

(Hmm I thought there were more reasons actually. And yea the last one is more hype, but bottom line is I had expectations of elevated proportions.)

I have to say though that the casting was really good.

Because its almost Halloween

2010-10-29T08:41:00.011-04:00

Enjoy this Psycho remake/mashup.
Look out for the original in bottom right and Gus Van Sant's remake in top left.

And check out Psycho the way its meant to be seen at Film Forum this weekend through November 4th!

Hitchcock was constantly finding ways to test the production code enforcers of the day, and Psycho is chocked full of "questionable" material: Marion in lingerie, a nude shower scene...

Even flushing a toilet (seen frequently in the clips above) was controversial in films of the day. According to Hitch's writer Joseph Stefano, "A toilet had never been seen on-screen before, let alone flushing it. I thought if I could begin to unhinge audiences by showing a toilet flushing -- we all suffer from peccadilloes from toilet procedures -- they'd be so out of it by the time of the shower murder, it would be an absolute killer."*

Sure enough, the censors objected to this scene and Marion in her lingerie, and the nudity in the shower scene, but Hitchcock hatched elaborate bluffs and schemes manipulating them to approve the footage. But that's another blog post! One more thing about the significance of this bathroom scene, Film theorist Slavoj Zizek does a great piece about the significance of toilets and drains in a close reading of Psycho and The Conversation, in his great film The Perverts Guide to Cinema.

If you do plan on checking this out at Film Forum (and you should!) Here's something to keep in mind while the lights go out:

Back in the day (1960 that is) Hitchcock went awsomely overboard hyping the release of this movie, restricting critics from advance showings so nothing could be given away, and instructing theaters with strict directions:

"Close your house curtains over the screen after the end-titles of the picture, and keep the theater dark for half a minute. During these thirty seconds of stygian blackness, the suspense of Psycho is indelibly engraved in the mind of the audience, later to be discussed among gaping friends and relations. You will then bring up houselights of a greenish hue, and shine spotlights of this ominous he across the faces of your departing patrons."*

*These quotes and anecdotes are from "Alfred Hitchock: A Life in Darkness and Light" by Patrick McGilligan, 2003.

New York Film Fest Funfest Fest

2010-10-03T11:57:00.001-04:00

The New York Film Festival is, as they say in the biz, 'on and popping', and you know the TCP had get a piece of the action. Actually deciding what to see was quite an ordeal, which is another story in itself. We settled on Of Gods and Men, this year's Grand Jury Prize winner at Cannes.

There's nothing really to say about OGAM that's not covered in the synopsis. True story, very serious, subtitles. But what I will say is that the new Alice Tully Hall at Lincoln Center is, to borrow another phrase from the biz, 'the shizznat'. Franco-Christian Monks filing paperwork never sounded so good.

One fish, two fish...

2010-09-24T16:47:00.003-04:00

Going into the Regal Union Square Stadium 14 theater last night, my mind was made up that Catfish was nothing but a hoax. I'm not sure why I was so sure about this. I think it mostly had to do with the well-crafted trailer which has a certain 'you've-never-seen-anything-like-this-and-there's-probably-a-good-reason-for-that' feel to it.

Well my friends, Catfish is real. Really fake! Psyche. It's real...ly bad! Got you that time. Hey c'mon! Oh I was only kidding! Come back!

Annnnd scene.

[Catfish. Out now in select theaters]

Breakfast Clubbing

2010-09-23T10:58:00.013-04:00

So, I was graciously invited to a special screening celebrating the 25th anniversary of “The Breakfast Club" hosted by the Film Society of Lincoln Center. Seeing it on the big screen with a jam packed audience at the gorgeous Paris theater left me reading things more closely than the last time I caught this on TV.

That might also be due to Kevin Smith's interview with Molly, Allie, Judd and Anthony following the screening. Let it be known: Kevin Smith is freakin' hilarious - would it be beneath him to consider stand up? The Wall Street Journal did a pretty good job covering their shmooze-fest here. They'll tell you what Emilio was up to.

I was born in '84 so I can ride the '80s pop culture train but only if I'm accompanied by an adult. Therefore, I relate way (waaaaaaaay) more to the '90s but I can't name a teen movie of the decade that even touches Breakfast Club's simple sincerity. During the cast member chit chat we learned that John Hughes cut a ton of BS from the final product of this film: dream sequences, half naked teachers, more kissing. And he let the crew improvise a ton on their own, so what came together (due in large part to a genius editor) is a bare bones story without any distractions.

I never thought I'd look back on the '80s and call them simple times -I mean- the hair teasing alone seemed like a lot of work to me. But watching this now made me very nostalgic for my heyday in the 90s, as do lots of things these days.

Anyway's, now I'm inspired to find highlights in under-the-radar-90's teen movies. Get ready for a regular segment on this topic. Suggestions are welcome!

Awesome image credit: Mark Todd, commissioned by Entertainment Weekly.

Lesson Up

2010-09-23T10:22:00.005-04:00

Cause and effect [Coz ehnd ehfehkt]
n. and n.
1. Pretty self-explanatory

E.g. The PR machine for David Fincher's upcoming Facebook thriller, 'The Social Network', is in full force, at times painting its firebrand CEO Mark Zuckerberg in somewhat of an assclownish light. As it happens, this week Zuckerberg has announced his commitment to donate $100 million dollars to the Newark school system. Now that's some cause and effect ish right there.

(The real lesson here, of course, is that it is in the public's interest to make as many slanderous, unauthorized biopics about our most hyper-rich moneybags. Now go and be bad.)

69 Boy(girl)z

2010-09-10T13:45:00.001-04:00

I grew up in a cable TV-less household. This left me with seven basic channels to choose from: CBS, NBC, ABC, FOX, UPN 9, WPIX and PBS. There were probably several reasons why WPIX (which has since dropped the far-from-vestigal W in its name) was my favorite of the bunch, but all I can recall at this present moment is that it was the closest thing I had to a movie channel. What I remember most are the commercials they ran for their movies. Well actually just a little salient bit of each. For example there's the clip from 'Moonstruck' where Cher urges some guy to 'Snap out of it!' and, without fail, slaps him in the face. Another I can recall is for 'Tootsie' with the stars & stripes imagery shown in the picture above. I remember it so goddamn well. However I never saw either of these movies.

Now when my pizza guy demanded that I watch Tootsie the other week, I expected to see something along the lines of Dustin Hoffman as a woman marching and saluting the camera for two hours. I was wrong. It's more like Dustin Hoffman as Mrs. Doubtfire for two hours, but replace Sally Fields with steady employment.

Choice quote: 'Tell me what's wrong or I'll kill you.'

dumb or retarded

2009-04-01T08:20:00.002-04:00

(the TCP has temporarily awakened from its REM sleep to participate in lucid screening's third annual white elephant blog-a-f*ck-i-just-watched-a-really-sh*tty-movie extravaganza)

assignment: DOA: Dead or Alive

i love trying new things. like this floating glass shelf i installed in my apartment during my leisure time. i'd never used a drill independently (powerful!). nor had i ever purchased screws at a hardware store before (15 cents each!). firsts are funnnn.

this axiom does not always hold true however. some firsts are horrible. like your first oral surgery procedure. or your first holocaust nightmare. or watching your first feature-length movie based on a mildly-popular xbox game by a company called mindfire. yea, some firsts aren't fun at all.

'coming soon to video' trailers: a movie called 'black sheep' that doesn't star chris farley, 'red line' which is impossibly not listed on imdb, and 'born to fight' which literally has no reason to exist except to meet the $2.99 price point at the waldbaum's checkout display.

i've never played DOA before so that may have hindered my overall viewing experience. so many questions! why would the DOA tournament knowingly invite a 'master thief' to compete? why would the passcode to the vault containing the $100 MM cash prize be 'hidden' on the neck of the founder's daughter? it's literally under her ponytail.

i did know going in about DOA Xtreme Beach Volleyball. so when the contestants organized their own beach volleyball game, i gave myself a high-five in my brain cuz i was totally in on it.

the movie itself is broken up into days, which is really cool because that's how time works.

kevin nash (above, acting) used to be a professional wrestler called kevin nash. in DOA he is asked to provide comic relief. hahaha! the star of DOA is eric roberts whose acting credits include the silver-haired lothario in the killers' mr. brightside video and the well-dressed lothario in mariah's we belong together video.

thank you to whoever suggested this piece of crap.
dead or alive? dead. definitely dead.

shhhh...

2009-03-15T22:27:00.004-04:00

this blog is sleeping..

oh yea

2008-11-22T17:22:00.002-05:00

i know i'm mad tardy on this one, but ALL criterion movies are 40% off on their website 'til this tuesday.

where she stops, somebody knows

2008-11-09T13:12:00.004-05:00

comedic improv takes on many forms. literally! improv forms provide structure to an art form that otherwise is as structureless as a swedish jellyfish.

say for instance you and i are doing a scene where you play a fireman and i'm your incompetent, easily-distracted boss. our scene finds us speeding down a city block to put out a fire, but i want to stop and get a free cone at ben & jerry's because i happened to have voted earlier that morning. in an act of blind loyalty, you join me in line.

this scene could go on forever, of course, but what should happen is that it gets "edited" and a completely new scene starts (maybe at a zoo). now, depending on what kind of form we agreed on beforehand, another member of our group could initiate a scene where we revisit our established hapless fireman and child-like boss characters. and our group would be on the same page because the form called for it. so there you go. improv exposed (wipes hands clean, takes sip from ssips box).

la ronde (french for, the round) is an improv form inspired by the max olphus film from 1950. the movie consists, essentially, of two-person scenes where the first character to enter is the first to leave and a new character is introduced in a new scene with the second character from the first scene. this goes on for 1.5 hours where ultimately, things come full circle. you can see how this can be used in improv.

the table-mannered dog in the picture above is the only character not a part of the 'la ronde', though his scene with the boozed up count is most enjoyable. as for the rest of the movie, people come and people go, some you are happy to see exit where others you wish could stick around a bit longer. one of these is simon simone's chambermaid. straight fire.

wish this movie was funnier. but i guess that's not fair to mr. olhpus who never asked to be the founder of a comedic improv form.

2008-11-05T09:51:00.001-05:00

america has finally listened.

brizzness time

2008-10-28T13:02:00.009-04:00

on some non-criterion criterion stuff, this months gq has a photo essay on the definitive women of film. mentioned honorably are criterion faves like jean luc-godard's one time wifey, anna karina, aka shorty from band of outsiders, that sexy ass bowler toting dimepiece from the barely bearable unbearable lightness of being, and the woman who i once bedded in my former life as a a whiskey swigging, drug abusing stagehand for the stones in swingin' 60's london- julie christie. it is well worth a looksie.

not to be overlooked, we here at the tcp have put together our own list of criterion hotties for your consideration in no particular order of smashability:

5. sissy spacek, 3 women

there's something sexy about scary women. not in the campy elvyra kind of way but in that penetrating sissy spacek gaze kind of way.

5a. sweetie

i'm a man who appreciates a nice porterhouse of a woman. i also find mental instability more than a little attractive. sweetie fulfills all these pre-reqs.

4. paola pitagora, fists in the pocket

she looks like barbara streisand, who i do not find attractive and sophia coppola who reminds me of a young barbara streisand. therefore, i now find barbara streisand attractive. this pic does little to illustrate my point but she's fly nonetheless.

3.aboriginal women, walkabout.

getting lost in the outback has never been sexier.

2. susan george, straw dogs (solving world peace in her head, up top)

sex crimes portrayed on film can be awkward. it's even more awkward when the girl in question is a susan george caliber dime brizzle. you have to remind yourself that at least you're not into anime porn- that would definitely be worse, right?

1. olivia d'abo, kicking & screaming

as a tike, formulating what would be a future of perceptions of what women should and shouldn't be, her character on the wonder years was the prototype. i hug-pounded my pre-pubescent self when she came on screen in kicking & screaming. he didn't know how to receive the hug pound and head-bunted me in the scrotes. the older me needed that.

so that's our list. let the debating begin or whatever.

synecdon'tsee

2008-10-28T12:39:00.007-04:00

we're all going to die. got it? if not, please go see synecdoche, new york and learn, slowly.

hole up

2008-10-16T20:45:00.003-04:00

british director mike leigh has a new movie out called happy-go-lucky. its ads announce 'aw shucks' reviews like 'it will make you love life again', 'a reason to be on planet earth' and 'i finally called my daughter'. what the reviews don't say is that this whimsical, flighty flick is brained from the same man who brought naked into the world. this is like finding out that shel silverstein used to write books that were unforgettably effed up and demented.
thought y'all should know.

keep it thoro

2008-10-12T13:38:00.003-04:00

the 10th grade was a blur. most of my time was spent in the livingston mall world foot locker stock room, box cutter in hand, hot sam in my belly. it was within these mobb deep-blaring environs that i experienced my first legit black girl crush and heartbreak. her name intentionally escapes me, but her sauciness i will never forget. she had the elegant eyes of a disney princess and lips seductively penciled in a way i had not seen duplicated in the halls of my admittedly white high school. a true dime, indeed.

she, too beautiful for suburban retail, and myself becoming acquainted with phase IV of boyhood awkwardness, our frequent, brief exchanges had an air of the surreal. i'd be intently organizing the men's new balance running section (always a bitch) and i'd glance down the hall to find her sauntering over, eyes locked on mine. to whatever i said, she found to be the most interesting thing she'd heard form anyone ever. back then (and even now, kinda) that was all it took to have my heart. soon i had visions of my nubian foot locker fling and i stealing the show at the upcoming homecoming dance. i had fallen so hard that i was nearly willing to work an extra shift for free just so i could be around her. if i hadn't called my mom to ask her if i could work for free, i would have. completely serious.

it didn't take me long thereafter to realize that this was what my manager wanted all along. although never confirmed, i'm convinced my ebony goddess had, at my manager's behest, flirted with me and impressively feigned attraction to keep me a happy, devoted foot lockerer.
she was damn fine so i ain't mad at him.

i also vaguely remember reading shakespeare's macbeth in the 10th grade, which is the inspiration for akira kurosawa's throne of blood.

veal scalp

2008-08-28T20:47:00.003-04:00

the picture above is of a masterful lego re-creation of one of the more disturbing scenes from the honeymoon killers.

the construction worker on the left is actually an old lady (that's supposed to be the old maid hat that the poor woman actually wears to bed) who just realized that her 'husband' (dude chillin on the couch) is nowhere near the man she thought he was. in between the two is the sweetie-like character who is insane and madly in love with dude on couch. she has a freaking hammer in her hand and is about to problem solve.

this is not the most disturbing scene. this is also based on a true story. this has the grandma from 'everybody loves raymond' in it.

$1.85 was steep for a veal cutlet in 1970.

when a woman's fed up

2008-08-02T17:13:00.004-04:00

it's been a long time, we pretty much left you. but the TCP is here in august, at least for today, turning the clocks back to the year 1955 and switching our gps default location over to france with henri-georges clouzot's les diabolique (which is actually playing on IFC).

the netflix synopsis gives away the first hour of plot: a principal's wife and his mistress are best of buds, they also both hate the principal and murder him. i totally thought i was in the driver's seat. then along comes the last 20 minutes and i am left with my pants at my ankles, lips sputtering uncontrollably and with no one to hold. sh*t is so crazy that there's actually a disclaimer right before the credits urging you to not spoil the ending.

there's not much else to talk about here. i'm just looking to move on with my life, really.

on the real

2008-07-09T11:44:00.002-04:00

go see wall-e

i'm only sleeping

2008-06-22T20:53:00.005-04:00

"...we're never going to survive unless we get a little crazy."
-seal

you don't need me to tell you that america as a society is dissolving like black and white footage in the nine inch nails 'closer' video. and if you do, i'd just tell you to watch shock corridor. here the american dream meets the american holy sh*t my brain has turned into horseradish mashed potatoes.

back in the late 60's the pulitzer prize meant everything. it meant so much in fact, that a journalist willing to institutionalize himself in order to close the book on an unsolved murder and nab the pulitzer passed as a plausible idea for a movie.
of course nothing goes anywhere near ok for this guy, and in between lobotomies, we meet a hoard of nymphos looking to party, a tiny man written for comic relief ('i am impotent...and i love it!'), and a black guy-hating black guy (at first it's casually made known that he enjoys collecting pillow cases...then it all becomes clear).

what's stayed with me most is the knowledge-drop from the journalist's noticeably modern-looking-for-the-60s roommate: "when we're sleeping, no one can tell a sane man from an insane man'.

time for bed.

I WANT A WOMAN!!

2008-05-28T22:25:00.012-04:00

this had to come out sooner or later: i have never seen a fellini movie. so when picking which one to see first, i went with amarcord, simply because a soho vintage store is named after it. c'mon, it had to be cool, right?...RIGHT?

well, the trailer makes it clear that this is from the 'new fellini'. so right off the bat, i knew i had effed up. i was not going to get a lynch-influencing mindf*ck i'm pretty sure fellini is known for. but as that 90's VW golf ad exclaimed, 'in the game of life, there is no reset button'. and despite my muddled knowledge of italy's socialist past and cultural hallmarks, amarcord and i are friends in the end. you see, we share similar interests such as yelling at your family, blind accordion players, and the female behind.

new fellini can hang his hat on this one boys-being-boys montage in which at one point he combines rube goldberg with human urine and it is FUNNY. also, weaving in and out of the movie is the scariest hooker ever put on screen.

in the picture above, a boy is living out his fantasy of a sexual tryst with the local overweight tobacco lady. he's lifting her in the air and she is getting turned on.

no country for young girls

2008-05-03T16:49:00.002-04:00

four weeks ago, i popped in picnic at hanging rock and watched the 7-minute trailer. no longer able to put it off, i have finally dragged myself to watch the actual movie.

i have not seen little women, pride and prejudice or captain ron, so i'm at a loss for a proper reference point. however i sure as hell have seen the truman show, which shares directors with hanging rock (peter weir). i will never forget the moment right after truman musters through the 50th thunderstorm thrown at him by ed harris and the newfound silence is broken by his rickety boat slamming into the white wall at the end of the 'ocean'. 20 minutes after hanging rock, very little has stayed with me, except for maybe how good the truman show was.

that said, hanging rock's saucy factor is pleasantly generous (see above), though unfortunately offset by 1900s dialogue ("i expect you to be word perfect") and hairstyles (bun). also, this movie would serve as a highly effective ad for bottled water.

under the covers: #33

2008-04-04T00:26:00.027-04:00

For the love of Pete, Inuits are cool. They spearfish, they have their own weird, esoteric version of the Olympics, and they dress like Andre 3000. And you have to respect the focus and concentration on this dude's face. But according to a recent US News & World report, Alaska's crime rate - violent crimes, in particular - is among the worst in the nation. While it might seem counterintuitive at first, it makes sense. I imagine the Inuit to be a territorial people and so pervasive is the hunting and tracking lifestyle that it is almost hardwired into their DNA. Which makes you wonder what this guy is really about to launch that spear at. It could be a fish. Or it could be the fuselage of a low-flying sea plane carrying life-saving rations for starving, at-risk Inuit families impoverished by deadly climate changes. Dude, what an a-hole.

Get Behind Me Satan

2008-03-30T23:23:00.101-04:00

For Lucid Screening's '08 White Elephant Blog-a-thon, I tried to bless somebody with "Airborn" but was forced to go with "Only the Strong" when the DVD proved unavailable. Both titles bring a smile to my face. And I wanted to share that smile with somebody. What I got in return was Evilspeak.

In the hands of a different creative team, Evilspeak could have been "Carrie," "Porky's," and "The Next Karate Kid" all rolled into one. And for my money, that movie would be crap. But I'd probably be down to eat a bowl of Cheerios to it.

Instead, in the hands of Eric Weston and Joseph Garofalo (no relation to Janine), and the dude who created "Beastmaster," we get gratuitous (and at one point, full frontal male) nudity, Satan-based computer apps, and a young Clint Howard whose range as an actor can only be measured in degrees buttdussy (that's booty, di*k, and putty). But, despite looking like he just caught a wave of hot ass every time the story requires him to emote, the likeable Howard seems right at home in a movie that 17 year-olds in 1994 would probably love to watch blunted.

Howard (pictured above, 8 degrees buttdussy) plays Stanley Coopersmith, who finds himself on the wrong end of a lot of ass kickings and spontaneous games of monkey in the middle. But when he stumbles upon an 18th century Satanic place of worship built by Bull from "Night Court", he inputs some Satanic verses into his 1982 Tandy Computer and after completing a checklist that includes at least one ritualistic sacrifice, is able to conjure Bull's spirit. And with the remaining fifteen minutes of the movie, Bull channels himself into Stanley's body, and together, then they get buck. It's worth noting that the fusion of Clint Howard and dude from "Night Court" at one point yields a single terrifying frame of Will Ferrell.

Evilspeak also boasts a supporting cast that includes several veterans of the USA original series circuit, the HeyHEYhey guy from "What's Happening!," and the Jewfro'd neighbor from "That 70's Show" as Coopersmith's main antagonist.

I'm still not sure what this movie is trying to be, or maybe I'm so sure that it scares me. What also scares me is the somewhat randomly juxtaposed and therefore infinitely creepy 3 seconds of Super-8 footage involving a naked woman, a wild boar, and a bathtub full of blood and guts.

Thanks again, White Elephant.

it was a graveyard smash

2008-03-30T20:59:00.019-04:00

(for the second running of the white elephant blog-a-thon over at lucid screening, i was initially assigned to watch howard the duck. netflix had other ideas.)

take two: orgy of the dead. things looked bleak right off the bat when i didn't recognize a single movie (the gore gore girls, etc.) in the 'enjoyed by members who enjoyed' section of netflix. i was starting to freak. i hate scary movies and the word 'dead' is in the title. you're probably saying to yourself, 'this man has never seen an ed wood flick before in his life'. you are goddamn right.

there is nothing scary about this movie. instead of focusing on the word 'dead', i should have been paying more attention to 'orgy'. if you like ta-ta's and thighs, dig in. but also if you like blatant inconsistencies and the denny's equivalent of dialogue - then please, sit.

80% of this movie takes place in what seems to be my best friend's backyard and roughly the same percentage involves topless white women shimmying to subtle variations of the hawaii five-o theme song. orgy of the dead teaches lifelong lessons like, 'a pussycat is meant to be whipped' and 'no one wants to see a man dance'. and it closes its eyes, reaches into the cliche grab bag, and pulls out the 'it was all a dream' ending b-sheit.

it's also worth noting that the trailer literally shows the entire movie and the dvd menu screen was seemingly created by an adult who has unashamedly mastered broderbund's kid pix design suite.

ain't nuthin but a mistake

2008-03-27T19:06:00.003-04:00

the TCP is back in black (...and white) with carol reed's the fallen idol. it's based on a graham greene short story, so it was safe to expect a story about foreigners in foreign countries and the promise of a murder. here we have the son of the french ambassador of england, phillippe (above, red-handed) who worships his globetrotting butler, mr. baines. i can confidently say that i have never encountered an on-screen character as annoying as this little child. an amazingly effective drinking game would just be to drink whenever phillipe says 'baines'. he literally says this in every scene.

since it was released in 1948, cops use the term 'blackies' and when found roaming the streets of london in his pajamas, phillipe is mockingly called nick carter. i wish i knew why.

red bo!

2008-03-21T12:33:00.005-04:00

check it:
red bull's showing some criterion love, using a jimmy cliff diddy from the harder they come for their new flugtag tv spots.

Big Girls Need Love Too

2008-03-17T22:56:00.007-04:00

Despite the fact that both delve into explicitly sexual thematic content, Catherine Breillat's "A ma Souer!" ("Fat Girl") has very little in common with "Fatty Girl," rapper Ludacris' 2001 paean to badonkadonks. While the latter is laden with overtly sexual chitter-chatter that would make for awkward car rides to Sunday mass with my parents when I was riding in the back seat and too far away from the radio to change the station, I could always bank on the fact that they at least wouldn't always be able to decipher Luda's many euphemisms for tush and bush. A ma Souer! leaves far less to the imagination.

This movie is basically about literally the worst m'er'effing family vacation in the history of western civilization. The main character is thirteen year old, Anais, who spends her vacation getting crapped on by the world and drowning her sorrows in man-sized servings of ice cream. She spends a large portion of the movie doggy paddling in a lonely swimming pool in a one-piece that's regrettably two sizes too small, and role playing make-out scenarios with the diving board. Her parents are distant, if well meaning, and her sister is a burgeoning ho-fo-sho. You breathe a sigh of relief for her towards the end of the movie when the family packs up the Volvo and heads home, but somehow things manage to get even worse from there.

If you're like me, you'll go into this movie thinking back fondly on your favorite donks and the electric energy and moral dubiousness of early Ludacris. But you'll leave with a tummy too full of raisinettes and a hollow feeling in your wiener. And isn't that really the mark of good filmmaking? In a word, no.

everybody really dies

2008-03-11T22:53:00.004-04:00

skateboarding, murder, subway restaurants. a dangerous combination, but gus van sant has carefully thrown them all together in his latest film, paranoid park.

van sant really gets busy on this one. the music would make you look cool if you played it at a party and the images are sam perkins smooth. it just has a really new vibe to it. watching this movie 15 years from now, you'll curl a little smile and say to yourself, 'wow this is so 2008', and then you'll clone yourself and make it wash your dishes.

as you probably know by now, the lead is a no-name actor (as is most of the cast, which was mostly picked off of myspacebook) gabe nevins. kinda fun fact: the 16 year old nevins never read the script and learned his lines on the spot. every now and then, nevins reminded me of the incessant nose scratcher in dazed and confused in the worst way possible.

last thing worth noting is that there's a shower scene that is so ill, i'm sure someone's going to put it up on youtube.

and a happy new year

2008-02-17T16:50:00.008-05:00

to celebrate mr. bardem's doubleyew last sunday, the TCP swivels its poorly-disciplined attention over to the land of spain with the spirit of the beehive. while the movie's title will make as little sense after watching it as it does right now, what you will take away is how incredibly naive you were as a kid.

following the precocious antics of ana (above, entranced) as she blindly tries to locate and hang out with frankenstein, beehive is not some kind of reverse sixth sense. there are moments in this movie that make you 'rewind that' like dennis quaid in the vantage point trailer. one wtf moment involves a prank that ana's twin sister, isabel, pulls that PLAYS YOU. another involves kids playing with a bonfire like it's the neighbor's sprinkler.

throughout the film, ana is almost run over by a train, nearly falls into a well, and is thisclose to being shot. it's also worth noting that beehive's use of frankenstein is one of the better movie-within-a-movie moments this side of home "filthy animal" alone.

oh and happy leap year day.

charlatan kane

2008-01-25T15:42:00.000-05:00

in 2005, i went to a tribeca film festival screening of a doc about director and good friend of iron mike tyson, james toback. once the lights came back on, they did a little q&a with the director that no one really cared about, but then mr. toback came out, looking heavy and with a cane, to a thunderous applause. at one point someone asked him what his favorite movie is, to which he said without a blink, "f for fake".

it's impossible to prepare your brain for this movie. orson welles has made something here that ushered in mtv breakneck editing, wes anderson credits, and everything that guy ritchie has made. you will notice this.

the opening credits consists of shots of a long-legged woman in a thank-you-lord fitting dress walking through the streets of what looks like paris, interspliced with the have-mercy expressions of male bystanders. from there it goes in a completely different direction, but you don't mind.

there's also the most amazing awkward silence standoff between two people interviewed individually. and i'm pretty sure a monkey beats off on this guy's shoulder at one point. could just be me...

i'm still alive

2007-11-06T09:19:00.002-05:00

staying in newish release mode, i finally brought myself to see sean penn's into the wild. there was a lot of hype around this one, so i tried my darndest to level expectations. although not "life changing", it's a risky movie with a wring-your-damn-neck message (careers are for the weak! you are slaves to your money!) that manages not to fall flat on its face.

emile hirsch as the well-read wanderlust channels a young leo dicap in his hey. the likeness though is merely looks-wise. whenever hirsch opens his mouth his voice never sounds like you would expect it to. characters are entranced by his above-it-all worldview, almost instantly.
mr. penn makes his presence felt: characters break the 4th wall and love interests have zits.
but the star here is eddie vedder, who created original songs specifically for the film. low-fi and twangy, pearl jam's mastermind has created a work of music that encapsulates the one-with-nature feel penn has painted with his camera.

wait, scratch that, the real star is this old man towards the end of the film who will steal your heart and make you call your dad.

you can't handle the troof

2007-11-05T12:29:00.000-05:00

Seeing as how awards season is just beyond the horizon, I deemed it necessary to take a break from The Criterion Collection and instead focus on some current films that have recently hit theaters with plenty of buzz (noooo, not Bee Movie).

First on the list, the Georgey Clooney driven vehicle, Michael Clayton, in which Clooney plays the "janitor" of a swanky corporate NYC law firm whose job it is to clean up the firm's messiest fiascos. This movie is hard-hitting from the first frame and is perfectly edited as the pacing is right on point and the movie runs just shy of 2 hours. Michael Clayton keeps the audience interested and entertained throughout as first-time director Tony Gilroy brings the same type of energy as seen in the bourne trilogy, of which he is the scribe. Clooney delivers a stellar performance, taking an otherwise generic legal thriller and raising it up a few notches. Tilda Swinton kills it despite her short time on the screen, and she effectively made me want to slap the sh*t out of her character, Karen Crowder, who is chief legal counsel for a corrupt agrichemical giant. Despite the obvious villains in the movie, the strong plot, with its share of twists and turns, is cemented by solid acting performances and a promising directorial debut.

***Bonus thought: Did the Michael Clayton poster bite from the Man Who Fell to Earth?

nightmares of the rich and famous

2007-10-18T09:20:00.000-04:00

in true TCP fashion, we are late to commemorate the passing of revered swedish director ingmar bergman. we have no one to blame but kapil. for some real insight, listen to woody allen's musings on the subject.

to do our part we watched bergman's wild strawberries. over an entire day in the twilight years of an accomplished doctor, Isak Borg (above, toasting), we get a glimpse of how scary impending death can be: nightmares in the daytime, a lifetime's worth of horrible memories that pop-up without asking, youngsters vocalizing how terrible getting old must be while you butter your croissant. being old and lonely doesn't get easier if your son is a prick, your daughter in-law openly dislikes you, and your maid of the past 40 years refuses to call you by anything but Professor.

notables: the ill use of lighting; witnessing the worst couple of all time; a trio of teens who are so damn stylish, despite the fact that this was made over 50 years ago; Isak's virtually immortal mother's swedish articulation; oh, and the final sequence.

talkin bout my generation

2007-08-19T17:34:00.000-04:00

it's cool when things all come together. not like having your birthday fall on christmas/hanukah/president's day, but more like when your 7th grade english teacher assigns a 5-paragraph essay on the same book your neighbor gave you as a birthday/hanukah present the year before.

now we at the TCP have been doing this criterion thing for about 9 months and this summer just so happens to be the 40th anniversary of the summer of love, '67, the same summer of the monterey pop festival in rice-a-roni, cali. performers include the mamas and the papas, janis joplin, simon and garfunkel, jimi, and otis redding. a doc had been made for the 3-day music festival by d.a. pennebaker that is, wait for it, in the criterion collection. as clarissa would say, "way cool".

the mont pop fest is easily one of our most enjoyable viewing experiences. before watching it is helpful to know a few things:

it was one of jimi hendix's first live performances in america, as well as the who's (who's'?)
clive "endive" davis was in attendance and signed a young janis joplin immediately after
the mamas and the papas were on their way out
otis redding killed it

while watching, please notice how there is absolutely no corporate/brand presence.

at around 80 minutes or so, it's short, but it's rare when you can see firsthand the origins of cliches, and this concert gave birth to a good handful (e.g. the who violently smashing their instruments, jimi lighting his guitar on fire). worth a looksie.

and the shape of a question mark on his forehead

2007-07-16T09:50:00.000-04:00

this week (as if we're really weekly) we decided the TCP needed an estrogen boost, so we went with jane campion's first feature film, sweetie. which is fitting, since it's also my first campion experience. aside from knowing of its australian origins and 1989 production date, going in my expectations = zero.

what is sweetie? who is sweetie? unfortuntately, these questions are answered at the midway point, when one of the most contemptible and repulsive characters ever put on film tazmanian devils herself into the plot. sweetie, you see, is the once-institutionalized sister to kay, our main character. everything sweetie touches turns to unbearable. you see that precious toy horse up there? it ends up getting coughed out of sweetie's mouth with gobs of blood and bile.

sweetie aside, sweetie is a beautiful movie. if you want to see how colors should go together and you enjoy well-framed shots, see this. however, considering everything else, such as story, sweetie's a tough one to sit through. despite a modest 97 minute runtime, the plot trudges like those huge guys that pull 18-wheelers with a harness strapped to their necks.

we each hit a breaking point. for me, it was the horse eating. for jim, it was the treehouse. i dare you to find out what i mean by this. well, you already know about the horse eating, but still...the treehouse...

thief's theme

2007-06-25T15:17:00.000-04:00

Been a minute since my last post. Late Spring has not proved fruitful for the TCP. Speaking of fruit, one of my favorites is green apples. Thieves' Highway (not to be confused with Lost Highway) shares my produce preference.

Had to see this one dolo, cuz Kapil is allergic to black and white and I admittedly bailed on Jim.

TH is a simple crowd-pleaser with a simple demand: accept the lazy eyes of both leads.
The script is smart and the acting goes down easy. Like all movies set before 1985, much of your attention will be spent laughing to yourself (unless you're watching with other people, for some reason) how different things were then. The rest of your attention will be paid to how much maintenance driving a truck back in 1949 required.

Also, TH has what must be the origin of the ol' embarrassed-male-reluctant-to-say-'I love you'-on-the-phone-in-front-of-the-guys scenario.
And, Jack Oakie, on the right, was deaf during the entire shoot. Though he looks a bit off up there in the pic, his performance gives off no indication of his impairment.

go for the apples. stay for the acting.

(Instru)mentally Ill

2007-06-03T22:29:00.000-04:00

Going into Marco Bellochio's I Pugni in Tasca (Fists in the Pocket), we knew little more than that the DVD cover art was ill. Right off the bat, we were drawn by the score, by Ennio Morricone, who Kiki acutely pointed out was an ill dude (and recipient of a 2007 Honorary Academy Award for Acheivement in music). He then promptly fell asleep.

He missed an old Italian masterpiece about a mentally ill dude (above) who believes that he'd be doing a great service to the world and his eldest brother, the only well adjusted member of a dysfunctional family, by killing his mother and younger siblings. In the meantime, he crushes on his own sister (dimepiece Paola Pitagora), takes a driving test, and hatches a plan to invest money in a chinchilla farm. Complicating things are his own conscience, a nondescript cranial malady, and the fact that chinchilla farms cost a guap.

Almost sounds kind of like a dark comedy right? It's not. It's definitely not.

Juan Apagado Spends a Lot of Time Wandering Around Town

2007-06-01T19:31:00.000-04:00

We inadvertently kept it real Texas on Memorial Day by hitting up the local Tex-Mex spot and then hitting up the surprisingly thorough DVD section at Barnes and Noble where we decided on copping "Slacker," Richard Linklater's chronicle of a day in Austin.

Don't get it twisted. "Slacker" isn't "Dazed and Confused," despite the fact that both document generations of disaffected youth. It's also not to be confused with "Slackers," the Devon Sawa star-making vehicle. For better or worse, the film that put Linklater on the map (sort of) is still regarded as the OG "indie" flick. But for me, it's cool because it's like a time capsule to the early 90's. One of the dudes was sporting a dope Batman T-shirt that I used to rock ca. '89. Dunkin' Donuts cereal makes a brief cameo. And then there's the drummer from the Butthole Surfers showing off her newly acquired (and above pictured) Madonna Pap Smear. But it's probably not for everybody. Linklater's intent here was to structure the plot around loosely connected ideas interwoven by creative transitions. In short, it's something of an experiment and you'll probably get more out of it if you view it as such. If you like plot, don't come around here. But if you like stories, Linklater's got a chair and a beer coozie with your name on it.

Tatis F@%k!

2007-05-28T00:41:00.000-04:00

After a long layover, the TCP train finally got back on track and made a stop in 50's France for auteur Jacques Tatis' "Mon Oncle" and with all due respect to whoever, all parties involved unanimously decided that we probably don't like you if you like this movie. Although the movie is a comedy and is therefore not as joyless or over earnest as some past TCP stuff dealing with essentially the same content (satire on postmodern alienation/ consumerism), it was still the most difficult TCP viewing thus far because the jokes just don't hold up anymore. The fact that Tatis' opening sequence, overall visual aesthetic, and oddball overall feel (killin' it with the wide angle-dope set pieces) were so ill helps me understand why people think this is a masterpiece, but it did little to make the movie more palatable.

Conversely, if you like Mr. Bean, you might enjoy this. Incidentally, Tatis is the progenitor of Mr. Bean as per Rowan Atkinson's own admission. IMO, the verdict is out on whether or not that helps or hurts his case.

In closing, I want to start a flame war on imdb about this movie.

baby sham

2007-04-09T21:04:00.000-04:00

since my netflix account was backed up this week, jim and i were forced to scour blockbuster colonia for a criterion movie. we quickly passed on armageddon, which we're saving for a later date. i had my pick and jim understandably had issues with it. for some reason the check-out line spanned the entire sci-fi section, which bought jim more than enough time to find a plan b. thank the lord the cashiers are poorly trained.

here's the taglines of the harder they come:
dem a loot, dem a shoot, dem a wail in shanty town;
With a Piece in His Hand He Takes on the Man!; and the clearly babel-fished,
He Makes Women and the Charts and is on top with both.

the harder they come was lying in the drama section, but this jamaican tale should have been placed with the foreign films. subtitles are a must unless you are rastafari. speaking of the subtitles, they have a mind of their own here. some scenes have them, some don't. it's their chill way of trying to teach you the language, or something.

you could say the harder they come is like the OG get rich or die trying, without the speech impediment.
BO!

[title removed]

2007-03-28T13:21:00.000-04:00

brazil, i mean, brazil...where to start? the most visual of romps, brazil is a cinematic manifestation of nervous laughter and leaves you wondering when the nightmares will start.

it's important to lay out some context here: brazil is set in the future ("sometime in the 20th [not a typo] century") and was completed in 1985. being that it's now 2007, there's no way this movie can not be a mindblow. oh and it's from the man behind monty python.

mini roll call of who's lurking in this bad boy: the surly grandma from who's the boss (her scenes freaked the ish out of jim), the dad from garden state (criterion alum), and mario from super mario bros. (as an electrician--presumably auditioning for the part).

can't leave out how huge de niro's cameo is. with one of the best entrances evs, he's like an old friend, a life preserver to save you from an ocean of oddness. also, i'd really like to know how he went about doing his research for this part.
(thanks lex for the rec)

300

2007-03-27T01:21:00.000-04:00

Oh herrrroooo. I'm not sure if you have heard of 300, so I figured I'd let you in on my little secret. This flick tells the tall tale of the Battle of Thermopylae, in which the King of Sparta leads 300 of Sparta's best soldiers versus a Persian army numbered in the hundreds of thousands.

Visually, this movie is stunning and you will undoubtedly agree (unless of course you're one of the many haters who seemed to whine about Frank Miller's other comic book adapted for the big screen, Sin City). Also, expect lots o' dramatic speeches and gore & blood.

Downsides include subpar acting although Gerard Butler convinces as King Leonidas, predictable plot line, and it is evident the filmmakers watched Gladiator about 300 too many times (oh snap!).

If you want to be entertained and can appreciate this movie for what it is, definitely peep this. Just don't smudge the dude's puma who is sitting next to you once the movie is over, you ain't built like them 300 boys.

P.S. Director Zack Snyder also directed Michael Jordan's Playground.

a history of insanity

2007-03-07T23:07:00.000-05:00

you see this guy? yea, it's an alien smoking a cig and sipping on a cocktail. and you know what? he's in naked lunch like it's the most normal thing in the world. and you don't even want to know who he's talking to...

actually it's peter weller, who plays the most badass exterminator ever captured on screen. he's almost as badass as the dapper police chief from jaws. and he's in this too.

there's also an enthralling monologue about a man with a talking butt and the haunting use of a parrot cage.

did i like this movie? not especially, it's completely nonsensical. however it does make me want to visit tangier.

(i can't hear y'all)

2007-03-03T11:26:00.000-05:00

saw zodiac last night. was expecting a lot. got a lot. of movie. almost 3 hours.

it's no secret that the zodiac killer was never caught and i wish that wasn't the case.

go for robert downz (criterion alum), stay for mark ruffalo.

not sure what it is (anyone?), but the song during the first murder and again at the end credits completely owns. UPDATE: It's Hurdy Gurdy Man by Donovan

if it wasn't for imdb, i could never be sure if that dude from grounded for life was in this (he is).

also of note is fincher's what-must-be-record-breaking use of date/time subtitles.

zodiac is not a friday night movie. see it on a sunday.

related: what's your zodiac sign?

***UPDATE: the director, David Fincher, uses tons of unnoticeable CGI to make this film

oscar buzzed part 2

2007-03-01T13:12:00.000-05:00

having now seen "notes on a scandal," which i saw this morning, i've verified that i'll probably never care about the best actress categories. there's a reason they announce the best female jump off like an hour before the best male awards are given out. that said, cate blanchett and judi dench both killed it in this movie. i give their performances an 8 and 8.5 out of 10 respectively. but does that mean that they deserve an award for it? neither of them were playin idi amin, man. and you know what? neither of them could pull that off any damn way.

p.s.: noas was adapted for screen by patrick marber, who wrote "closer."

Oscar Buzzed

2007-02-26T15:08:00.000-05:00

oscar monday, new york

recap:

gosling didn't win and i didn't win $500.
guillermo del toro does not react positively to flattery.
contemporary dance is hyphy.
clint eastwood knows italian.
forest whitaker
the dude who wrote "little miss sunshine" was matthew broderick's personal assistant.
john mayer can HEAR colors.

for those of you who missed it, you didn't really miss too much, but you won't understand this recap.

and mama feld couldn't get through the book

2007-02-21T17:28:00.000-05:00

all was in place for this one--president's day vaca, benihana in our belly, kapil's even present. now showing: the unbearable lightness of being. ok, gotta watch the trailer first. oh snap! a young daniel day lewis! lots of fly honeys! this is looking good. kaps's gettin comfy, promises he won't fall asleep. bags of reese's p-cups and g-worms holding us down. jim's got his 3 cans of coke at the ready.

cut to:
20 mins in and i'm being asked to put on Oprah.
80 mins in and jim admits he's never had more trouble following the story of a movie.
85 mins and kapil's passed out with a tummy ache.

i watched the second disc (!) on my own. the movie gods rewarded me with an appearance by the MIT prof from good will hunting but then later gave me a wet-willy in the form of one of the most ludicrous endings evz.

+: the colors, i guess
-: smugness, lack of coherent chronology, overdose of "tush and bush"

memph bleak

2007-02-06T12:30:00.000-05:00

saw mike leigh's naked last weekend. don't feel like writing about it. actually, i don't feel like doing much these days. why bother? some kind of apocalypse is headed our way. don't you read nostradmus? you have a very sad looking face. you live near here?--within walking distance? mind if i take a bath in your flat and talk about your dead dog?

naked leaves you feeling just that--with only your dvd remote and the stop button to console you. we follow a 6 foot 7 misanthropic erudite rapist with nothing to lose (pictured) in 1993 london as he encounters situations that ultimately gravitate towards rape. somehow, some way, mr. leigh created an even more menacing character (not pictured) who WILL remind you of someone you grew up with.

jim and i agreed that this movie is best viewed alone. and on the real, the 6'7" vagabond absolutely kills it.

East Side Walkabout

2007-01-29T13:51:00.000-05:00

Walkabout doesn't go out of its way to explain anything really, which is weirdly refereshing. Like the protagonists, we're kept in the dark and left to take in the imagery, which is raw. Even so we were naturally inclined to put a backstory on it.

Walkabout begins with anthropologist who decides to do a case study in the Outback, but for reasons unbeknownst to us, takes his children with him. Obvz, he gets lost with no gas and only as much food as can fit in a picnic basket. You can guess what happens next. Or can you?

Here's a hint, it's not as scary as you might think. Which technically means it could be much scarier. Which is it? Easily both.

every last homey

2007-01-22T16:42:00.000-05:00

in my freshman year of college, i had a roommate who really liked tom waits. said roommate also enjoyed using lysol as a shower substitute and from time to time incorporating items found on the street (like the cane of an old man) into his wardrobe. i'm pretty sure he hated me.
i'd also imagine that he's seen down by law (cuz waits is in it, doye).

although made in '86, jim believes DBL ushered in the 90s. while watching, we felt compelled to point out what was "90's" about it although i can't think of any examples right now. at times, it looks like mtv back when it played music videos and nwa had taken over america. o yea, and part of it takes place in the Orleans Parish Prison...OPP...IS YOUR MIND BLOWN!?!?!

this is the first movie i've seen with roberto benigni and i now wish he was a pocket-sized commodity that you could give to your friends when they're feeling down. and if i was balding, i'd want to bald like him.

Jason Graduates

2007-01-14T12:46:00.000-05:00

it took me a good sec to find an image for kicking and screaming cuz will ferrell's mug was all up in my google search. this movie does not involve the misadventures of an incompetent dad who decides to coach his son's youth soccer team in a misguided attempt to win the respect of both his son and his own father.

k and s is about some dudes from vassar, reluctantly nicknamed the cougars, who try to cope with post-grad life in 1995, a time when going to prague was a unique idea, only 12 (creepy-ass link warning) jason movies had been released, and the knicks were perennial playoff hopefuls.

like a lot of criterion movies we've seen so far, we were quick to dismiss the movie. but while we were pointing out negatives (eg cheesy acting, actors' resemblences to hs classmates), before we knew it we were mad enthralled.

added bonus(es): knowing another movie the guy from outside providence has been in. AND where the the older sister from the wonder years has been. o yea, and parker posey kills it here.

A Full Minute of Silence

2007-01-08T14:55:00.000-05:00

In Jean-Luc Godard's "Band of Outsiders," the protagonists attempt to engage in a full minute of silence (in reality, 36 seconds). It made me think about sound and hearing and deafness, which prompted me to wikipedia all kinds of crazy sound related stuff. Here are my findings:

Singer-songwriter/guitarist, John Mayer, suffers from music-color synesthesia, which occurs when someone experiences sort of a problem in neurological wiring wherein they mix-up senses. In this case, the result is the ability to hear colors. John Mayer can HEAR colors.

Rated RPG

2007-01-05T14:19:00.000-05:00

***In lieu of whatever and pretty much because we feel like it coupled with the re-emergence of our Mormon friend Beef, we decided to post about current movies too. We realize that this moment represents a Sea Change in the way we present and you read this blog, but you probably don't even read this yet anyway. But you will... ***

Watching Children of Men is like a videogame except without the interactivity. Criterion favorite Julianne Moore makes a good cameo. Michael Caine's character is kind of cheesy, but maybe it's because I can't see him as a hippie. The action sequences are impressive. It's pretty crazy that this comes from the same guy who did "Y tu Mama Tambien." I think it would probably be cool to make a dolly track out of magnets like that bullet train in Shanghai. Children of Men reminded Feld of GTA. I thought it was more like Metal Gear Solid. Kiki wanted to know who ripped tush. It's not Blade Runner and the book is probably better (I haven't read it though), but it's definitely worth watching.

BOO Radley

2007-01-02T11:54:00.000-05:00

band of outsiders is one of those movies that by calling it cool, it makes you sound cool as well. so yea, this movie is mad cool...

..and french. cigarettes are constantly afire, the wardrobes are 10 years ahead of new york, and kapil was bored.

but to kapil's delight, BOO features a dime brizzle to match any dime brizzle. she can dance, sorta sing, and hates the boulevards.

watching this movie will show you how you should be dressing and how not to talk to women. it also hints at the recent emergence of NASCAR.

the clip above, which features an absurdly ill dance sequence, best demonstrates the film's overall poppin-ness. enjoy.

and happy 2k7.

Happy Holidays

2006-12-26T12:33:00.000-05:00

A movie about holidays for the holidays. Except Jules et Jim is about different holidays. French people in countries like Europe and England go on holidays which is to say that's what they call their vacations there. These are usually 3-4 day trips that involve staying in cottages, singing songs, and awkwardness. In France, class is designated by sweaters. Everybody is a writer or musician. And women are not to be trusted. This is what I've gleaned from Jules et Jim. Happy Holidays.

love triangle, schmove schmiangle

2006-12-22T13:51:00.000-05:00

allow me to put my hating cap on real quick, for jules et jim is not on point.

there's a love triangle going on here between jules jim and catherine. and they're all idiots.

Jim: congratulations Jules on your new life and marrying the girl of your dreams.
Jules: she no longer likes me, you want her?
Jim: ok.

Catherine: please come over.
Jim: but you're married to my best friend Jules and you pulled a gun on me last time.
Catherine: but i'm really lonely.
Jim: ok wait right there.

the one highlight for us was when catherine serenades her men. even though her diddy's in french, it translates into english while still maintaining its rhyme scheme. best part by far.
J&J had some ill coats too. as do most of the male leads in the Criterion thus far.
we'll see how this compares to our next selection which is also from the land of france, band of outsiders. a bien tot.

I'm Afraid of this Movie

2006-12-17T12:02:00.000-05:00

it's been two weeks after we first saw the man who fell to earth and i'm finally almost ready to revisit it.what i took away from bowie's vanity project was that if i saw it when i was 5, i would not be the same person i am today.

like there's this one scene where, on a whim, bowie's character locks himself in the bathroom and removes all of his hair (and eyeball covers) and then reveals himself to this poor woman who just wants him to stop watching his 15 tvs every now and then and who, upon seeing that her skinny, androgynous lover is actually a nipple-less martian freak, proceeds to pee her pink miniskirt.

after this scene, TMWFTE gets all 70's on us and we feel like we're intruding on something that we don't even want to be a part of anyway. but there is this one song near the beginning when rip torn's character is introduced that is so freaking amazing i wish i remembered how it went.

Life on Mars

2006-12-06T03:04:00.000-05:00

ARI
Two words. Asian Horror.
(hands him a script)

VINCE
I don't know Ari. I don't do
horror.

E
(less than amused)
Come on, Ari. A Japanese remake?
Don't you think Vince is beyond that?

ARI
I would agree, E, if it wasn't
being directed by one of the greatest
English directors of our time.
Turn to page five.

VINCE
(turning a page)
Nicolas Roiyg?!

ARI
Boom!!

VINCE
Bad Timing? Don't Look Now? I had
nightmares about David Bowie
until I was thirteen after
The Man Who Fell to Earth .
Roiyg is a genius.

VINCE
What do you think E?

They all wait on E to say something.

E
Looks like we're going to England.

HEAR song 2 by Blur.
End Credits.

Never duplicated

2006-12-03T02:28:00.000-05:00

Before i go into the final altman selection, Secret Honor, i have to bring up something.
While looking for our page on google, we found out that some dude in california had the same idea as we did.
nice work.

ok so due to scheduling conflicts i watched secret honor, which is a faux-reality account of a post-watergate Nixon, with my right hand girl Jonna. she was asleep for 80% of it. and i was jealous. you see, this movie is kind of like a play...with one set..annnd one actor. it made me feel young. and invariably restless.

btw we're nowhere to be found on google...yet.

pud intended.

2006-12-03T00:24:00.000-05:00

Short Cuts. 2nd Altman (RIP) flick thus far. And it's a doozy, replete with comas, phone sex, jazz, and Tom Waits. And Fred Ward. It's too bad that this film is so frequently lumped in with ensemble pieces like Crash, and SC simulacrum "Magnolia." What separates this film from the latter is the fact that it's not nearly as heavy handed or into itself.

Altman's feminist bent is present in droves. Bare vages seem to be of thematic significance as is the interplay between sexually potent females and pudenda obsessed men. Julianne Moore is forever NSFW, for better or worse. Tim Robbins as a traffic cop kicks game to a woman in a clown costume.

Short Cuts is a skewed and twisted slice of life that explores failed and failing relationships, death and denial, and drinking in the city with a cast that rivals any in recent memory. Altman handles his biz. I don't care what anybody says, PT Anderson bit this movie hard and is clearly the Quentin Tarantino of overlong multiplot.

Criterion Collection is oversexed.

Sociables

2006-12-01T17:50:00.000-05:00

the menu screen for 3 Women is scary. shelly duvall is saucy. and sissy spacek was carrie.

altman (rip) shares with us his interests of pool mosaics and food snacks.

this movie is rated R, which is weird cuz most of it takes place at a spa for senior citizens, but then you get to the 2nd-to-last scene and you understand.

It's All Happening

2006-12-01T16:39:00.000-05:00

Billy Liar is one that slipped under our radar, scooped at the local West Coast Video based solely on the dope cover art and the criterion stamp. It's fresher than a 40 year old film should be.

Billy is 20-something and wants to be a writer but would rather be sleeping. It's fun and familiar without being predictable. And Julie Christie is a dime.

ya like dags?....then watch Straw Dogs

2006-12-01T16:37:00.000-05:00

if you are a fan of mysterious plotlines....capable actors (read: Dustin Hoffman, pre Meet the Fockers).....aggressive sexuality.....and strange locales, then peep Straw Dogs.

microphone check 1,2..

2006-12-01T15:17:00.000-05:00

...what is this

good question. one without an answer, maybe. or perhaps one with more answers than we'll ever know. who cares. what we do know is that we are going to be watching a lot of movies--at a comfortable pace.

thank you for your bloggership (?)

note: this intro is a little misleading because we've already started The Criterion Project (TCP) about 1.5 months ago. immediate subsequent posts will be hazy recaps.