Douglas Sirk

Oh, honey, anyone who can link mid-eighties Dylan to Sirk is elegance personified.

"The gentleman certainly know what he wants"

That is a genius line.

YOU WERE A VERY APT PUPIL

heaven forbid a film appeal to people other than film snobs.

Eric, the folks who howl their way through old movies at Film Forum and "Chelsea Classics" drag screenings are not run-of-the-mill hoi polloi, who I think do a better job of entering into the spirit of a period film. They are hipster assholes (and in the all-gay screenings, unbearable Marys) who should be home watching contemporary "golden age" TV.

(This doesn't even apply exclusively to period films -- the FF audience pretty much ruined the last Werner Herzog movie)

http://www.criterion.com/content/images/full_boxshot/457_box_348x490.jpg

In January

Magnificent cover!

Damnit, I just scanned the thread and now I really want to see There's Always Tomorrow, which of course still isn't out on any stateside release.

I can burn you a copy if you want.

Cool. I'll drop a line soon.

Swoon on that DVD news.

OK, I wouldn't blame an audience for laughing through MO.

I always get the pipe-smoking prophet in that movie confused with the sub-genius guy.

Maybe he doesn't even smoke a pipe, but he has the same crazy glint in his eye.

Lots of funny stuff in Rock Hudson's Home Movies about that dude constantly touching Rock. Damn good actor, Otto Kruger. He played a VERY different, downright evil character in Hitchcock's Saboteur. You wanted to beat up his face in that one, you did. And for the millions of Joan Crawford freaks here, he stepped aside so JC could have Clark Gable in Chained.

OK, I wouldn't blame an audience for laughing through MO.

I laugh throughout every Sirk movie, but in the good way.

SPOILERS

Please tell me you don't laugh when she gets hit by the car...

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/20/movies/homevideo/20dvds.html?_r=1

otto krueger's character in this is truly insane

oh, i didn't know the '30s version was gonna be in this.

shd I see Interlude? June Allyson, ay yi yi.

On film, yes. On video, eh. Definitely lesser Sirk.

Mark Rappaport on Sirk & Hudson:

http://www.criterion.com/current/posts/935

Callahan on Interlude (many spoilers):

http://www.thehousenextdooronline.com/2009/02/trouble-water-douglas-sirks-interlude.html

While the Stahl films in the Anthology series are fairly similar in tone and style, the Sirk films vary quite a bit in their approach: perhaps because of Sirk's evolution, perhaps also because of the different demands of the troublesome adaptations, whose overt melodrama is the least of the problems they pose....
If, in my opinion, Stahl came off better than Sirk in the Anthology series, it's partly because Stahl's solemn detachment gives him needed distance from dubious material. Despite his reputation as a subversive director, Sirk essentially commits himself to the emotions that his authors and producers are trying to project - a much trickier game.

http://www.theauteurs.com/notebook/posts/532

Cease and desist.

Magnificent Obsession is almost dumb.

Like I said, subgenius.

i wanna see tarnished angels again:
one of his best films, but somehow it is rarely shown anywhere

ok, the Stahl version of MO is so much sillier he doesn't even try very hard, letting Dunne & Robert Taylor (cute) play it like a romcom.

anyone besides James Redd endorse my seeing this tomorrow?

http://bam.org/view.aspx?pid=1550

I'd go if I could. John Gavin rowrr.

was NRQ banned because of this thread? i think so.

It's not about John Gavin, it's about the rubble, it's about the black market, the black market goods, the black market girls. Try these goods, buy these goods. Oh wait, wrong movie.

KJB?

Like a moth to a flame...

Yes, by all means, go see A Time to Love and a Time to Die. It's quite different from the meticulously upholstered Ross Hunter epics or the acidic Americana of the early 1950s partially because much of it takes place amongst the rubble of WWII. But Sirk's genius for character/camera placement is very much in evidence even in these reduced settings. Perhaps even more so since it comes off just as intense and melodramatic as anything else he did.

Yes, go!

It's a good film, but John Gavin is poor man's Rock (also, ick on Remarque echoing end of All Quiet, if that finale is his). Lovely new print tho.

Klaus Kinski in a bit! I liked how all the signage was in German. otoh, Don DeFore from "Hazel"...

it's a good film, but there are better,sharper Sirk movies on his filmography.
Though the mise en scene and camerawork are excellent and the contrast between the war and the romantic story is remarkably shown,the film is too long, and Sirk seems to lose some power when he is out of his regular territory.
(Tarnised Angels, another adaptation made more or less at the same time, is a much better Sirk-out-of-his-style movie imo)

Glenn Kenny on aTtL&aTtD (and Sirk's personal angle):

http://www.theauteurs.com/notebook/posts/593

Hm. Hadn't realized until I read response to that linked article that the female lead was the woman who played the umlaut-brushing-up secretary in One, Two, Three.

yeah, I saw that in her credits!

I do like all those scenes in the rubble of Bremen. The location stuff was all in Berlin, acc to the iMdB.

'written on the wind', oh man. obviously a lot of bait for subtext hounds, but this film is completely entertaining and just beautiful to look at. the shot at the end, w/dorothy malone sitting at a desk with a model oil derrick: A+++

One of my favorite movies of all time. In some ways I like it more than All That Heaven Allows for it's simplicity.

They threw me out of geology school for having rocks in my head.

Or maybe it's: He got straight As in Geology. I got thrown out of school for having rocks in my head.

Summer Storm out on DVD now. Quality a bit soft but waaaay better than my ancient copy taped off Canadian TV. Minor Sirk but it stars the incomparable Hugo Haas.

is written in the wind the one where he's got the wild child sister who fucks shit up 4 every1?

anyone read this book on the making of Imitation of Life? (published last year, now in p'back)

no. link?

http://us.macmillan.com/borntobehurt

imitation of life was my bubby's favourite movie.

Is bubby British for servant?

s1ocki made his grandma tie his shoes?