bless those kids
― Gukbe, Sunday, 19 December 2010 08:42 (thirteen years ago) link
what's up w/ this dude that the hyper-detailed mise en scene of mass destruction of war of the worlds or parts of war horse can be so authentically horrifying, but the sentimentality of those films' final acts can be staged and shot in such a risibly phoney way? shouldn't this guy have been a horror director?
― flesh, the devil, and a wolf (wolf) (amateurist), Friday, 17 February 2012 12:39 (twelve years ago) link
didn't find either risibly phony, but u know, we've argued this for 8 years. If anything ppl are complaining about the violence of WH being reined in to keep it family-appropriate. (The scene of the brothers' execution in front of the windmill is pure, poetic Hollywood imagemaking in the classical style.)
Kaminski said the orange skies at the end of WH were real (I know this likely isn't what you're principally addressing).
― Literal Facepalms (Dr Morbius), Friday, 17 February 2012 12:57 (twelve years ago) link
Haven't seen War Horse, but I understand visually (at least) it's a conscious throw-back hybrid. War of the Worlds is just a clumsy script that didn't put nearly enough effort into the people as it did the action sequences. Here I invoke an interview I did with David Koepp, where (off the record) he nonetheless still diplomatically implied some of the worst things about Lost World (gymkata girl) were ideas imposed on his script by corporate committee. Spielberg has lately been pretty unabashed about Lucas's crap "Crystal Skull" script, basically being a good sport, saying "hey, it was his story." Don't know if that's a defense or anything, but I think Spielberg knows when to hold 'em and knows when to fold 'em, essentially.
― Josh in Chicago, Friday, 17 February 2012 14:10 (twelve years ago) link
i just found the staging of the reunions in WotW and WH to be impossibly stilted and phoney, almost ludicrously so. i don't get the feeling that spielberg feels it; he can't imagine a convincing, much less an unexpected, way to stage this sort of thing. yet many of his scenes of utter horror are admirably inventive and effective.
but opinions are opinions.
― flesh, the devil, and a wolf (wolf) (amateurist), Friday, 17 February 2012 15:13 (twelve years ago) link
also i don't know that we've argued about spielberg before, at least not that much. i don't have very strong opinions on the guy in general.
― flesh, the devil, and a wolf (wolf) (amateurist), Friday, 17 February 2012 15:19 (twelve years ago) link
I meant the communal "we," hehe.
In the case of War of the Worlds character is action to a large degree; 90% of it worked for me, and i am inclined to fuckin' hate Tom Cruise.
― Literal Facepalms (Dr Morbius), Friday, 17 February 2012 15:22 (twelve years ago) link
i don't get the feeling that spielberg feels it; he can't imagine a convincing, much less an unexpected, way to stage this sort of thing. yet many of his scenes of utter horror are admirably inventive and effective.
been over this 100x on ILX but this nails exactly what's so suggestive about the final scenes of A.I. imo.
but I dunno I find the standard Spielberg "happy ending" kind of a mannerist affectation of his at this point...there's something strictly formal, i guess you could say, about its function in the narrative.
― ryan, Friday, 17 February 2012 15:45 (twelve years ago) link
especially in the sense that they almost seem detachable from the movie proper.
― ryan, Friday, 17 February 2012 15:56 (twelve years ago) link
well, in the case of War Horse, a reconciliation/happy ending is part of what he's adapting, it's a children's book!
― Literal Facepalms (Dr Morbius), Friday, 17 February 2012 16:02 (twelve years ago) link
i feel like spielberg has the ability to infuse anything he does with a shitload of movie magic for lack of a better term, and sometimes its astounding and sometimes its a huge disaster (Always), usually if the material's too thin or bad to be redeemed. the reunion at the end of WotW is just dumb to me, but in WH i thought it worked. and i think the staging in WH's final scenes are just better and more interesting; in war of the worlds its risibly phony but in war horse it feels more like hes going for some heightened non-reality 'fable' - and i guess your reaction to that could be dependent on how skeptical you are of modern fables
i really liked War Horse
― RudolfHitlerFtw (Hungry4Ass), Friday, 17 February 2012 16:08 (twelve years ago) link
I just don't get the utility of phrases like "heightened non-reality" re Hollywood studio-made films (and many others made elsewhere)... this is what all but *maybe* 2 of his films are. That's what Hitchcock films were. When mainstream filmmakers decided to be "gritty" between the '50s and '70s, they made up a new heightened-reality version of naturalism! (stealing that last point from Stephin Merritt I think)
― Literal Facepalms (Dr Morbius), Friday, 17 February 2012 16:13 (twelve years ago) link
that's why to me Cassavettes films look more like Storybook Land than a Selznick production.
― Exile in lolville (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Friday, 17 February 2012 16:17 (twelve years ago) link
i don't really know where you're coming from morbs! i would agree that many filmmakers are working in a heightened reality idiom, even those whose work is characterized as naturalistic, but im just talking about this specific movie. i didn't mean it critically, just that the ending of war horse seems conspicuously different from anything else you see in movies today - the composition (which struck me as Ford-like, not that im an expert), use of color, music - in a way that evokes the movies of SS's childhood
― RudolfHitlerFtw (Hungry4Ass), Friday, 17 February 2012 16:57 (twelve years ago) link
Yeah, when the material calls for it (ie not in Munich), he mines that vein expertly (tho WH is only a semi-success for me).
― Literal Facepalms (Dr Morbius), Friday, 17 February 2012 17:23 (twelve years ago) link
― Exile in lolville (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Friday, February 17, 2012 10:17 AM (3 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink
wha--? this applies more to, like, jules dassin than cassavetes.
― flesh, the devil, and a wolf (wolf) (amateurist), Friday, 17 February 2012 19:41 (twelve years ago) link
yeah the ending of war horse was seriously mega-stylized (no less than the much more interesting climactic scene of haywire) -- i don't see how you can argue against that.
― flesh, the devil, and a wolf (wolf) (amateurist), Friday, 17 February 2012 19:42 (twelve years ago) link
what would a not-stylized ending look like?
The boy and horse going home is more a coda -- the 'endings' seem more like the two scenes before that.
― Literal Facepalms (Dr Morbius), Friday, 17 February 2012 20:08 (twelve years ago) link
So is the "ending" the " ... and zee horse" part?
― dead-trius (Eric H.), Friday, 17 February 2012 20:14 (twelve years ago) link
much more interesting climactic scene of haywire
challops!
― RudolfHitlerFtw (Hungry4Ass), Friday, 17 February 2012 20:16 (twelve years ago) link
Is that French granddad? I saw it 2-1/2 months ago, 98% of it is gone.
xp
― Literal Facepalms (Dr Morbius), Friday, 17 February 2012 20:16 (twelve years ago) link
Yeah, it's the 2 seconds of suspense about whether the horse and the boy will actually end up being allowed to stay together.
― dead-trius (Eric H.), Friday, 17 February 2012 20:25 (twelve years ago) link
― RudolfHitlerFtw (Hungry4Ass), Friday, February 17, 2012 2:16 PM (15 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink
not really. whatever you think of haywire, the climactic scene on the beach is great.
― flesh, the devil, and a wolf (wolf) (amateurist), Friday, 17 February 2012 20:33 (twelve years ago) link
Cassavettes' naturalism is way stylized.
― Exile in lolville (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Friday, 17 February 2012 21:14 (twelve years ago) link
do you mean in the performances? because that i get, completely.
as for the mise-en-scene in other respects, i don't get it.
― flesh, the devil, and a wolf (wolf) (amateurist), Friday, 17 February 2012 21:15 (twelve years ago) link
that was the worst fight in the movie!
― RudolfHitlerFtw (Hungry4Ass), Friday, 17 February 2012 21:15 (twelve years ago) link
well in terms of fight choreography, maybe.
in terms of crazy editing and deliberately mismatched lighting, hell no.
― flesh, the devil, and a wolf (wolf) (amateurist), Friday, 17 February 2012 21:16 (twelve years ago) link
the shot of her running up behind mcgregor is great. the way the fight was shot really grated me, with the camera centered on like a nice sunset with the two fighters stuffed in the corner. it further depersonalized a conflict that was already thin and difficult to care about. i felt like soderbergh was throwing it in the audiences face in an unpleasant way
― RudolfHitlerFtw (Hungry4Ass), Friday, 17 February 2012 21:17 (twelve years ago) link
that's probably true, but i like the way that instead of trying to match the lighting they just allow the sunset light to radically shift with each cut. i thought that was kind of brilliant.
― flesh, the devil, and a wolf (wolf) (amateurist), Friday, 17 February 2012 21:18 (twelve years ago) link
there are also lots of really (deliberately i assume) jarring elliptical cuts.
yeah i rarely notice editing choices like that. i'd be interested in reading an analysis of some of the things he was doing stylistically - i couldn't really tell why he made certain decisions (like how he shot that beach fight), maybe it's really obvious from a certain perspective, he seems to have like a unifying aesthetic for each movie he does
― RudolfHitlerFtw (Hungry4Ass), Friday, 17 February 2012 21:59 (twelve years ago) link
I'd love to see a comparison between that scene and a "standard" action scene because it certainly felt different. i remember one particular cut that shifted the POV exactly 180 degrees, which certainly seemed unusual to my eyes.
― ryan, Friday, 17 February 2012 22:05 (twelve years ago) link
oh, great
― Literal Facepalms (Dr Morbius), Friday, 17 February 2012 22:44 (twelve years ago) link
oh great people are actually talking about movies in an interesting and detailed way
― the jazz zinger (s1ocki), Friday, 17 February 2012 23:48 (twelve years ago) link
I just happen to like stayin on topic
― Literal Facepalms (Dr Morbius), Saturday, 18 February 2012 01:19 (twelve years ago) link
Classic.
― dead-trius (Eric H.), Saturday, 18 February 2012 04:37 (twelve years ago) link
on the early TV work:
http://www.reverseshot.com/article/spielbergs_early_television_work
― Literal Facepalms (Dr Morbius), Monday, 19 March 2012 20:25 (twelve years ago) link
Some great essays on Spielberg, plus memorabilia and diary excerpts from Truffaut's acting stint on CE3K, in the February Cahiers.
― Lawanda Pageboy (Capitaine Jay Vee), Monday, 19 March 2012 23:02 (twelve years ago) link
Reverse Shot continues its Spielberg coverage: http://www.reverseshot.com/section/steven_spielberg
Munich
War of the Worlds
― GoT SPOILER ALERT (Gukbe), Thursday, 26 April 2012 16:15 (eleven years ago) link
Tom Hiddleston sure can wear an uniform (as he proved in The Deep Blue Sea).
― Exile in lolville (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, 8 May 2012 21:20 (eleven years ago) link
He played one of the sharks?
― bark ruffalo (latebloomer), Tuesday, 8 May 2012 22:57 (eleven years ago) link
He played Samuel L. Jackson.
― Josh in Chicago, Tuesday, 8 May 2012 23:37 (eleven years ago) link
Goldman isn't a fan then..
http://achtenblog.blogspot.co.uk/2007/08/saving-private-ryan-goldman-essay.html
― piscesx, Wednesday, 9 May 2012 00:09 (eleven years ago) link
ha i remember reading that in Premier. pretty OTM to be honest.
― bark ruffalo (latebloomer), Wednesday, 9 May 2012 00:35 (eleven years ago) link
Janusz Kaminski on 11 shots:
http://www.vulture.com/2012/11/how-steven-spielberg-cinematographer-janusz-kaminski-got-these-shots.html
― saltwater incursion (Dr Morbius), Wednesday, 14 November 2012 18:15 (eleven years ago) link
Munich"It's almost over-the-top to some degree, right?" admits Kaminski
― Bobby Ken Doll (Eric H.), Wednesday, 14 November 2012 19:19 (eleven years ago) link
and all the better for it.
― saltwater incursion (Dr Morbius), Wednesday, 14 November 2012 19:21 (eleven years ago) link
What the hell. Ranked my favorite Spielbergs out in response to that Salon ranking and here's what I came up with:
01. A.I. Artificial Intelligence 200102. E.T.: The Extra-Terrestrial 198203. Munich 200504. War of the Worlds 200505. Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom 198406. Close Encounters of the Third Kind 197707. Raiders of the Lost Ark 198108. Lincoln 201209. Schindler’s List 199310. Jurassic Park 199311. Minority Report 200212. War Horse 201113. Jaws 197514. Saving Private Ryan 199815. The Color Purple 198516. Catch Me If You Can 200217. The Lost World: Jurassic Park 199718. Amistad 199719. Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull 200820. Hook 199121. Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade 1989
Biggest blind spots still are Duel and Empire of the Sun.
― Bobby Ken Doll (Eric H.), Tuesday, 20 November 2012 14:41 (eleven years ago) link
Top 3 are always rotating, tho.
― Bobby Ken Doll (Eric H.), Tuesday, 20 November 2012 14:44 (eleven years ago) link
I'd place Jaws in the top ten instead of JP and our hierarchy differs but otherwise we're in perfect mind meld.
― the little prince of inane false binary hype (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, 20 November 2012 14:46 (eleven years ago) link