jonathan demme!

hey slocki, since i got a lot of shit from you on the rgm thread for not digging the movie, i'm curious why you think you wouldn't like it now

I've gotten some blowback on recommending Something Wild to people lately. Even if people admit the movie does more with the manic pixie dream girl archetype than most, they're still not glad they saw a movie where Melanie Griffith is a manic pixie dream girl.

I love Something Wild. Mr Veg made me watch it a fews ago, I love how it turns into a whole other movie

*a few years*

yeah i had be like "no, no, there's a tonal shift! just wait!" around the hotel scene

yeah I was NOT excited about it at all at first, lol

Difference is Griffith actually feels like a genuinely nutty and endearing character, not the random assemblage of indie quirks that made up later iterations of the form. She's more of a screwball heroine than anything

^^^

I think people are skeptical because Melanie Griffith has basically become a manic aging pixie.

Working Girl and Something Wild are maybe the only 2 movies I've really enjoyed her in, where I haven't wanted to stab myself in the eye.

She's amazing here. Demme gives her a closeup after Charlie unwittingly reveals how much she means to him that's devastating.

wow, dr morbs, your littl thread-bombs are transcendently irritating. would you ever care to actually explain, the first time out, any of your devastating contraventions of conventional wisdom? or is trolling just, you know, your thing?

― flesh, the devil, and a wolf (wolf) (amateurist), Saturday, 17 March 2012 15:11 (3 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

lol this movie

― by another name (amateurist), Tuesday, 13 April 2010 19:12 (1 year ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

formerly known as lol this guy

― by another name (amateurist), Tuesday, 13 April 2010 19:26 (1 year ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

this guy

― figuratively, but in a very real way (amateurist), Sunday, 15 November 2009 03:15 (2 years ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

this guy

― figuratively, but in a very real way (amateurist), Saturday, November 14, 2009 9:15 PM

like i said

― figuratively, but in a very real way (amateurist), Thursday, 31 December 2009 19:49 (2 years ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

this guy

― flesh, the devil, and a wolf (wolf) (amateurist), Saturday, 22 October 2011 00:10 (4 months ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

amplify?

― incredibly middlebrow (Dr Morbius), Saturday, 22 October 2011 00:28 (4 months ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

― Ward Fowler, Saturday, March 17, 2012 2:01 PM (3 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

this guy

Difference is Griffith actually feels like a genuinely nutty and endearing character, not the random assemblage of indie quirks that made up later iterations of the form. She's more of a screwball heroine than anything

― Number None, Saturday, March 17, 2012 2:49 PM (2 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

^^^

― Peppermint Patty Hearst (VegemiteGrrl), Saturday, March 17, 2012 2:53 PM (2 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

^^^

btw SW has my favorite use of music -- as commentary, found objects, counterpoint -- in a movie ever.

yeah seriously.

let's watch the ending shall we?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Z8NSqlaTMM

that film is a beautiful representation of the 1980s. dated in the best possible way.

I want The Feelies to play my reunion
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i_9Vlh1OtB8

i wonder -- is she actually hitting on him or is she playing with him since she probably knows he's not actually married to lulu?

also: love the couple in the background.

Demme has a great feel for music in general, imo. His choice of Goodbye Horses for the dancing scene in SoL was fucking genius. (Feel free to crap on my head now Morbs)

hey slocki, since i got a lot of shit from you on the rgm thread for not digging the movie, i'm curious why you think you wouldn't like it now

― da croupier, Saturday, March 17, 2012 3:40 PM (3 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

good question, i don't have a specific answer beyond 'it hasnt really stuck with me' tbh

no I like the way JD has used music, often

cept Storefront Hitchcock is Robyn on an off night

lol

always felt that Into The Night was easily the best of the urban/yuppie nightamre sub-genre. actually were After Hours, Something Wild and Into The Night the ONLY films in this sub genre? hm. well anyway i was recently amazed to see that someone else thought Into The Night was amazing too

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wr-CGHH6Ys0

great genre

Suddenly realizing that a good number of movies I've long intended to see were Demme's. And also that several are streaming on Netflix! Stop Making Sense and Rachel Getting Married (FUCK THA HATERS) are fantastic.

after hours is my favorite scorsese movie i think. it is good.

does naked fit into this subgenre btw?

mike leigh's?

I keep avoiding Mike Leigh's Naked, for perhaps obvious reasons.

yes

xpost

also frankenheimer's seconds is like a weird cousin to this subgenre no?

I've always loved 'Naked'. Its been a while since I rewatched it, but for me it's THE Thewlis performance. He can only ever be THAT guy to me.

I watched it again recently and it is... kind of great and kind of totally weird and maybe dated in some ways. Don't see it as part of this genre tho

Naked could be seen as the British equivalent of those movies but it's a helluva lot grimier and more disturbing. Funny too of course

Music-wise, how do people feel about Demme having Q Lazzarus change the Talking Heads to "Heaven is a place where nothing can go wrong" in Philadelphia?

gonna go out on a limb and say that the feelies and robyn hitchcock songs in truth with charlie are also a little shoehorned

truth about charlie, i mean. haven't seen the manchurian candidate remake so i can't say whether the Go4, Mission Of Burma and Jah Wobble tracks imdb lists on its soundtrack work.

Literally the only thing about Manchurian that works is casting Robyn Hitchcock as a villain.

naked doesnt fit the bill at all, it's not about a straight/yuppie/uptight dude accidentally cast into urban chaos

yeah, he really is already a part of that world. If it was about the security guard...

always felt that Into The Night was easily the best of the urban/yuppie nightamre sub-genre. actually were After Hours, Something Wild and Into The Night the ONLY films in this sub genre?

miracle mile fits the bill, i think.

outlier

desperately seeking susan, definitely.

and on the margins (different margins) are risky business and romancing the stone, etc.

but the reason why i'm here:

what do y'all think of "philadelphia"? aside from the neil young song, which is beyond criticism IMO.

Well-meaning, some good performances, but clumsy and mawkish? Also seemed like an apologia after Silence of the Lambs. (Agree that "Philadelphia"'s really nice.)

You can't buy Citizen's Band/Handle with Care on DVD--not officially, anyway. I found one place selling a bootleg. That's terrible. This would be perfect for Criterion.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xS7s6YkVKEI

The Truth About Charlie--which I reflexively want to call The Trouble with Charlie--was worse than I thought it'd be (was hoping for something in the neighborhood of pointless but attractive). Almost felt sorry for Thandie Newton. There is a good Silence of the Lambs joke if you can last past the awful Charles Aznavour end-credit sequence, itself a variation on something Demme did so well in Married to the Mob.