Abel Ferrara - C/D

http://www.bfi.org.uk/sightandsound/feature/102

Really liked this as a read for its novelty - a lot of flighty chops which don't make it onto film writing, but I haven't seen it.

what ppl think is so great about King of New York is that it's bad, obv

Biggie Smalls liked it well enough.

yes, Generations Y & Z look to dead gangsta rappers as the vanguard of film culture.

isn't there a Larry Semon Film Festival for you to attend, or something?!?

I have my quota of semen for the week

http://www.charlierose.com/view/interview/12250

hes got some miles on his for being 60

interesting they touch on a project w/ dafoe playing pasolini

cant imagine this 4:44 movie is good tho

the thing about KONY (whoa, makes you think) is not that it's not good but it's got this brutal momentum w/everyone in the film casting everything aside and trying to kill each other w/o regard for anything else and the actors kinda throw themselves into it really well imo and i love the OTTness and how everyone seems to be doing their own version of how to approach the material w/o much guidance. walken owns here, caruso is pretty exceptional, snipes and fishburne are great, victor argo is really good (as probably the only "decent" person in the entire film.) all of ferrara's films have this kind of energy, but i think this distills everything down to the basics nicely.

the graveyard scene is pretty tremendous, you think the film is going to take it from there in one direction but then walken shows up as if anticipating it and just finishes it there. not quite as awesome as the shotgun to the face at the end of 'to live and die in l.a.' but pretty dope regardless.

I really appreciate that you caught the levels of "owning," "great," "pretty exceptional," "pretty dope," "really good" ... the kind of discernment I expect from the minds of Cahiers du ILX.

done with film threads now I think, cept for the Snob ones

jesus spoilers for TL&DILA tho

SPOILER ALERT xxpost

morbs i really hope you don't keep that promise, you would be sorely missed.

by me especially

if i had a dollar for every time morbz stormed out of a thread (or type of thread) in a self-righteous huff, only to reappear to later to kvetch some more, i'd be in the 1% with enough to donate to another random ILXor to put him in the 1% as well.

EXCEPT I'VE NEVER BEEN OLDER and felt more like this board is a hueg waste of time.

quod erat demonstratum

how do you storm out of a thread?

After reading that essay above I am still unconvinced that KONY has anything to say.

Incidentally I just leared who Joseph Kony is today.

Her bad things about 4:44, except from those that think its amazing.

I'd like to see it, even if I've never been fully convinced of Abel Ferrara's talents.

35mm print in NYC Monday

http://www.ifccenter.com/films/ms-45/

oh sweet. obvs i can't see it but still.

i enjoyed his mulberry st doc.

his Depardieu film, taking off from the Dominique Strauss-Kahn case.

http://www.fandor.com/keyframe/daily-abel-ferraras-welcome-to-new-york

it's amazing how ppl have talked themselves into thinking jokey sleaze like Ms. 45 is "great"

which part disqualifies it, the jokiness or the sleaze?

Is Deparnude coming to the U.S.?

it's definitely something, no? it's a mess, and he definitely hasn't developed his talents much yet (not unlike some of cronenberg's earliest stuff in that regard), but i do think it makes an impact that other films don't. the "knowingness" of it isn't very endearing.

i think he's talented and i like a lot of his films (and TV episodes!) but the way that e.g. the french appreciate him gives me pause. that is, as some kind of atavistic modern primitive who represents the soul of urban america or what have you.

As someone who's interviewed Ferrara in person (and likes a lot of his movies—seeing Bad Lieutenant at the Angelika when it was brand new, especially coming in the wake of the comparatively ultra-slick King of New York, was like being punched in the face), I gotta say his public image is exactly that. This Nick Pinkerton column from 2013 kinda sums up how I feel, particularly this bit:

Ferrara’s concern with the relationship between surface and subterranean truths is nothing new. In fact, the director’s greatest creation is a character called “Abel Ferrara,” a shambling, grizzled, reckless, perpetually drugged-up walking staph infection who just happens to have lined up financing for and successfully completed the shooting of twenty-some films since 1976—hardly a likely accomplishment if this persona was the whole truth and nothing but, though Ferrara is careful not to let the mask slip before his public.

he isn't the first director to have a persona that's kind of belied by his films.... i just watched the john milius documentary and the guy comes across as a fabulist and self-mythologizer and asshole. it's hard to take his persona at all seriously. for example, the first thing he says in the film is that he isn't a "pure cinema" guy, that he doesn't care about images, that he just wants to tell a story. which may be true but it doesn't explain the best qualities of his films by a long shot.

I still was not prepared for Ms 45 being a campfest, that's all.

Look at what we have here:

http://www.theguardian.com/film/2014/sep/04/pasolini-review-abel-ferrara-willem-dafoe-venice-film

got a NYFF ticket for it just now

looking forward to this one, although i worry a little about the "last days" vampirish approach to the biopic (last 24 hrs etc.)

pretty much none of his films have played my little town for over a decade, so this is another i'll probably have to see on DVD

ferrara is one of those dudes who took a while to earn the accolades (or just the scandal) he achieved pretty early (esp from the french)

Morbz look forward to anything you say on this.

Be of some interest to see how much space he gives to the various conspiracies surrounding his death and all.

i kinda don't see him being especially concerned w/ that, and i think interviews suggest same

ah got it, frankly I wondered if the Xan Brooks piece might've said anything but I despise him so didn't make it beyond the headlines.

did you guys like the last days on earth one?

not seen anything since Go Go Tales (and before that -- Mary? i think i saw and disliked?)

mary was pretty terrible

i roundly enjoyed the mulberry street doc, he's a born actor really

upset with IFC Films

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/venice-director-abel-ferrara-attacks-730624

got tickets to the thursday screening of pasolini. now the question is, to what ferrara films should i subject my sensitive and empathetic wife in preparation?

How about Accatone? Was just in Rome and hanging out at Bar Necci, which is now somewhat of a shrine.

I thought Last Days on Earth was terrible.

I will be at Thursday screening too if you want to meet, Adam. Are you there Thurs as well, Dr. M.?

he wants Ferrara films, not Pasolini films.

Thurs 10/2, yes

Well, I cant suggest any of those.

Let's all meet for a post-show cocktail.

i'm down.

king of new york is the "safest" ferrara i can think of but i haven't seen the more recent films. keep in mind this is a young lady thought the herzog bad lieutenant was too brutal.

obv the OG for her, then. She knows Pasolini meets an unhappy end, yes?

(VP, u know that BASEBALL PLAYOFFS will be running all days & nights that week)

don't shoot any car radios!

omg did u just spoil the end of pasolini

i'm trying to toughen her up anyway, it's a cold world

Go Go Tales is pretty innocuous Ferrara, it's Runyonesque.

In that case, let's have a beer at a sports bar of your choosing, Dr. M.

he seems to always be pouting

I didn't realize New Rose Hotel was so popular - they sold every single copy of their limited edition run in less than three days! I'm guessing there'll be a large standard edition run.

Now I regret missing the 35mm screening at Roxy Cinema that took place earlier this year (with Ferrara himself in person).

I'll eventually give this film another chance, but in all honesty, I didn't think Amy Taubin was wrong when I first saw this.

I'd never seen "Ms. 45" before, but boy was that movie great.

halfway through the Abel Ferrara memoir and it’s pretty great. It’s very nontraditional, semi chronological, bounces back-and-forth a bit in its timeline, but generally seems to be moving forward. It’s very insightful in terms of how he managed to scrape together the money for a lot of these films, and above all else it’s an absolutely fascinating story of him making his way through Fun City-era NYC. for all of his reputation as an unapologetic abuser of drugs, he clearly regrets it, and while he does note that a lot of it felt pretty damn good, he certainly doesn’t romanticize his drug war stories.

We watched New Rose Hotel and it is kind of the cyberpunk movie I've always wanted. Maybe I could have used a little more tech and neon, but the obvious cheapness fit well and I vastly preferred it to some blockbuster-style movie. Both Walken and Defoe are good even if it seems like they got the script five minutes before shooting. Asia Argento is not that good, some of it could be the language, but her stiltedness kind of works in the role.

And Ryuichi Sakamoto's in it (for about 30 seconds)!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SWdMv6Tv3Lw

I love the look of NRH; cities reduced to hotel rooms, hallways, screens and bodies. One of Ferrara's best movies.

The look and music is so 90s.

His new autobio is supposed to be very good, and also sad.

It is indeed very good.

(the autobio, that is. Haven't seen NRH yet)

Nice interview with the screen writer of Bad Lieutenant

https://zoelund.com/docs/CF-interviews/Interview2-0796.html