Godard is champ, of course, the silly sexist old Maoist. Some of his recent work - esp. his video 'histories of cinema' - as brilliant and downright barmy as any of his 'classic' Nouvelle Vague stuff. Have sort've been taken aback by the anti-art flavour of some of the posts - we can have rockets and rayguns AND chin-scratching pseudery, we can have it ALL! Ok maybe we only get the 'cream' of French cinema - but what cream! And I haven't even mentioned Vigo, Renoir, Truffaut, Betrand Blier, etc etc.
― Andrew L, Monday, 30 July 2001 00:00 (twenty-two years ago) link
Rivette also made OUT ONE (which is 12 hours long), which = a film I must see before I die (tho won't). The cut version, OUT ONE: SPECTRE is a mere four hours long. I keep meaning to go see some of the Godards at the Lux or the NFT, but can find no one to go with!!
― mark s, Monday, 30 July 2001 00:00 (twenty-two years ago) link
Huh ? Dinosaures, brontosaures, tyrannosaures, etc. etc. What, do all other languages use the exact english words for dinosaurs? One translation thing that does get embarrassing is english movie titles turned into cutesy France slang, which never fails to sound incredibly dorky to Québec ears. Or worse, bad France translations of US TV shows where all the cultural references are turned into French ones - Family Ties in French is an all-time landmark of unspeakableness (unspeakability ?). However, translations of the Flintstones and The Simpsons = made in Québec, and they totally rox0r.
― Patrick, Monday, 30 July 2001 00:00 (twenty-two years ago) link
French film seen at young age and stuck with me permanently: "L'Atalante"
― Robin Carmody, Monday, 30 July 2001 00:00 (twenty-two years ago) link
― Simon Benson, Friday, 25 January 2002 01:00 (twenty-two years ago) link
Aren't you making some awfully sweeping generalizations?
― Nicole, Friday, 25 January 2002 01:00 (twenty-two years ago) link
― MarkH, Friday, 25 January 2002 01:00 (twenty-two years ago) link
I am not an idiot, I am a dolt - as I explained somewhere else.
― Pete, Friday, 25 January 2002 01:00 (twenty-two years ago) link
This is like..
― N., Saturday, 26 January 2002 01:00 (twenty-two years ago) link
― N. (nickdastoor), Friday, 10 January 2003 00:17 (twenty-one years ago) link
Is that like the French version of Porky's?
― o. nate (onate), Friday, 10 January 2003 00:20 (twenty-one years ago) link
you hate melies = you hate me
― mark s (mark s), Friday, 10 January 2003 10:42 (twenty-one years ago) link
― Pete (Pete), Friday, 10 January 2003 10:49 (twenty-one years ago) link
― mark s (mark s), Friday, 10 January 2003 10:54 (twenty-one years ago) link
― Pete (Pete), Friday, 10 January 2003 11:16 (twenty-one years ago) link
― Pete (Pete), Friday, 10 January 2003 11:17 (twenty-one years ago) link
― N. (nickdastoor), Friday, 10 January 2003 11:36 (twenty-one years ago) link
I would like to declare this the funniest thing any critic has said ever.
― Justyn Dillingham (Justyn Dillingham), Friday, 13 June 2003 08:37 (twenty years ago) link
― amateurist (amateurist), Friday, 13 June 2003 08:45 (twenty years ago) link
mark s loves melies = i love mark s (but you all know this)
― amateurist (amateurist), Friday, 13 June 2003 08:47 (twenty years ago) link
― Andrew Farrell (afarrell), Friday, 13 June 2003 09:15 (twenty years ago) link
― cozen¡ (Cozen), Saturday, 3 January 2004 00:25 (twenty years ago) link
― amateur!st (amateurist), Saturday, 3 January 2004 00:46 (twenty years ago) link
ace french films (don't know if already mentioned up thread): la haine / nikita / rififi
― Nik (Nik), Saturday, 3 January 2004 00:47 (twenty years ago) link
― Sarah McLusky (coco), Saturday, 3 January 2004 05:29 (twenty years ago) link
Some classics for y'all to vibe with: pts 1 and 3 of 'The Trilogy' (tho you need pt 2 as well), 'Code Unknown', 'La Haine', 'Irma Vep', 'Read My Lips'....
― Enrique (Enrique), Sunday, 4 January 2004 16:02 (twenty years ago) link
― dog latin (dog latin), Sunday, 4 January 2004 16:41 (twenty years ago) link
The other day I actually saw a decent Francois Ozon film for once, too (8 Women).
Pete is surely trolling, as I can't even begin to list all my favorite French films.
― @d@ml (nordicskilla), Sunday, 4 January 2004 18:02 (twenty years ago) link
― @d@ml (nordicskilla), Sunday, 4 January 2004 18:04 (twenty years ago) link
― Julio Desouza (jdesouza), Sunday, 4 January 2004 20:11 (twenty years ago) link
― Enrique (Enrique), Monday, 5 January 2004 09:26 (twenty years ago) link
Very torn on Trilogy. Liked One and Three, but felt none of them excelled as single films but the combined effect was really interesting. Apparently in France they showed them Two, One, Three: I don't think I would have gone back if I had seen two first. Yes to Irma Vep, and Read My Lips (thopugh it wastes its premise a touch). Last year was again a relatively mediocre year for French film though: if whatever Artificial Eye is distributing is to go by (but then every year seems a mediocre one for Artificial Eye: this year has already started with the ropey Kiss Of Life).
― Pete (Pete), Monday, 5 January 2004 09:44 (twenty years ago) link
I saw a v good film in same vein which is out in France this month: 'Work Hard, Play Hard'. Hope it crosses channel.
― Enrique (Enrique), Monday, 5 January 2004 09:49 (twenty years ago) link
If I could generalize a bit, one thing I notice in french films is a certain embodiment, and a linking of this embodiment to pleasure. This happens to two bodies: the bodies of the actors, and the body of the film.
The actors in french films have bodies, and enjoy them. (As opposed to British and American films, where plot and concept are seen to be the only legitimate concerns. I think this is what Pete is complaining about, in a very anglo-saxon way, when he says of 'Betty Blue' that they should have done the whole hog and made it pornography. He doesn't think the body has any business in anything except pron.)
Then there is 'embodiment' on the level of the film itself. The film has a body: it is not just a transparent 'window on life', but a thing we are invited to pay attention to as an artefact. In this sense, Godard is not so far from 'Les Demoiselles de Rochefort'. Both show an awareness of the film as something artificial, something being shaped, chopped, constructed, played with. The pleasure of playing with the medium is not restricted to the film-makers. The audience can share this pleasure.
My two eurocents.
― Momus (Momus), Monday, 5 January 2004 19:44 (twenty years ago) link
Momus, much of what you say about French films re:the body is even truer of many recent Spanish films.
― @d@ml (nordicskilla), Monday, 5 January 2004 19:47 (twenty years ago) link
I'm off to see 'Lost in Translation' in a couple of hours. And I expect that I will find it full of cultural jokes, plot, character and situation stuff, but somewhat lacking in the bodily aspects of what it's like to be in Japan. But let's see.
― Momus (Momus), Monday, 5 January 2004 19:51 (twenty years ago) link
― @d@ml (nordicskilla), Monday, 5 January 2004 19:54 (twenty years ago) link
― Eric H. (Eric H.), Monday, 5 January 2004 21:35 (twenty years ago) link
― @d@ml (nordicskilla), Monday, 5 January 2004 21:36 (twenty years ago) link
― dav¡d (Cozen), Tuesday, 6 January 2004 00:49 (twenty years ago) link
― Momus (Momus), Tuesday, 6 January 2004 01:46 (twenty years ago) link
― Momus (Momus), Tuesday, 6 January 2004 01:50 (twenty years ago) link
i wouldn't make any generalizations about "french films," although if you break it down by generation one can notice different trends and counter-trends at work. france is "the republic of images" and the cinema here is simply too historically and otherwise extensive to sustain generalizations.
― amateur!st (amateurist), Tuesday, 6 January 2004 15:00 (twenty years ago) link
― amateur!st (amateurist), Tuesday, 6 January 2004 15:01 (twenty years ago) link
― Pete (Pete), Tuesday, 6 January 2004 15:06 (twenty years ago) link
― amateur!st (amateurist), Tuesday, 6 January 2004 15:07 (twenty years ago) link
momus has a good point here, in that this DOES seem to be a cardinal (which is to say classical) aspect of the screenwriting ethos in america, which is unfortunate i think.
some american directors are able to animate their characters as COMMUNITIES and lend to the audience remarkably vivid and unpatronizing impressions of the secondary and even tertiary characters...john ford at his best does this.
and then there are directors who seem to aim for a level of abstraction even for the primary characters, like hal hartley. this achieves something different from the "centers of goodness" momus laments, but it may not be everyone's cup of tea.
― amateur!st (amateurist), Tuesday, 6 January 2004 15:10 (twenty years ago) link
― s1ocki (slutsky), Tuesday, 6 January 2004 15:27 (twenty years ago) link
― webcrack (music=crack), Tuesday, 6 January 2004 15:59 (twenty years ago) link
― Enrique (Enrique), Tuesday, 6 January 2004 16:02 (twenty years ago) link
I once was hanging out with a guy who’d just spent several days with Haneke for the purpose of writing a profile, and said it was very funny to hear Haneke speak at length against bourgeois conceit and aesthetic, while his extremely lovely wife produced an endless supply of homemade delectables from the kitchen. Him: “we must reject everything the bourgeois stands for”, her: “who wants some pie?”
― Preach The Crapen (flamboyant goon tie included),
Buñuel understood.
― hat trick of trashiness (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, 17 October 2023 16:01 (six months ago) link
Just to be clear, this house is both anti-bourgeois and pro-pie
― Preach The Crapen (flamboyant goon tie included), Tuesday, 17 October 2023 16:04 (six months ago) link
the discreet charm of the bourpiesie.
― hat trick of trashiness (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, 17 October 2023 16:06 (six months ago) link
Yep, which reminds me that someone voted Holiday on the Buses the best movie of all time in the Morbsies
This genuinely made me laugh - and I really can't remember if that was my vote or not. After all, it is a Hammer film.
― Ward Fowler, Tuesday, 17 October 2023 16:09 (six months ago) link
The website for the above table lists La Grande Illusion (1937) with an estimated 12.5 million admissions but the actual admissions are unknown.[3]
really, Renoir outsold Star Wars?
― jmm, Tuesday, 17 October 2023 16:23 (six months ago) link
Haneke is like Cronenberg and Greenaway for me - all over the map in terms of quality. The more the films open up, the better he is, and I'd recommend 71 Fragments of a Chronology of Chance as one of his most interesting and least didactic.
Very nice to see Buffet Froid and Le Feu Follet represented, the former is like if the 70s Buñuel films were actually funny. I was also under the impression that Je t’aime, je t’aime was basically forgotten, it's a strange choice for a Resnais.
Sorry not to see any André Téchiné, is he too bourgeois even for the French? Or too many good movies with no major standout to collect votes?
― Halfway there but for you, Tuesday, 17 October 2023 16:32 (six months ago) link
even here only Armond White, in his only moment of sanity, gets Téchiné.
― hat trick of trashiness (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, 17 October 2023 16:34 (six months ago) link
No Assayas either?
― Halfway there but for you, Tuesday, 17 October 2023 16:54 (six months ago) link
So I saw the Eustache features this weekend. And right now I am so pissed off at male sexual entitlement I'm beginning to think Valerie Solanas had a point. But I'll listen to arguments otherwise.
― Infanta Terrible (j.lu), Tuesday, 17 October 2023 17:28 (six months ago) link
Hmmm. I've only seen The Mother & The Whore, but felt v much like the Leaud character is supposed to be seen as an irredeemable prick? Not that that's a get out of jail free card or anything.
― Daniel_Rf, Tuesday, 17 October 2023 17:43 (six months ago) link
I agree with you that Leaud is supposed to be a chauvinist (who happens to have come through the events of 1968 with some very retrograde ideas about sexuality). But do viewers recognize that? Or that Veronika is less a whore or slut, but rather a target of men's sexual opportunism?
As for My Little Loves, it's overwhelmingly a coming-of-age piece--and coming of age defined very much in terms of accessing females, with no consideration of consent on their part. French society, either before or in the immediate wake of 1968, probably didn't think too much about recognizing a woman's right to say no, but sitting through these films was exhausting.,
― Infanta Terrible (j.lu), Tuesday, 17 October 2023 19:38 (six months ago) link
The Mother and the Whore (1973)Holiday on the Buses (1973)Do you see?
― Ward Fowler, Tuesday, 17 October 2023 19:45 (six months ago) link
"(who happens to have come through the events of 1968 with some very retrograde ideas about sexuality)"
The film is very much about the failures of '68.
But I say this as a man xp
― xyzzzz__, Tuesday, 17 October 2023 20:00 (six months ago) link
Didn't just happen in France either.
― Chris L, Tuesday, 17 October 2023 20:05 (six months ago) link
But do viewers recognize that? Or that Veronika is less a whore or slut, but rather a target of men's sexual opportunism?
Is "some do, some don't" too flippant an answer? I try not to think much about what audiences might think, as the internet has shown me ppl can be super dense even about the clearest of messages. Which is not to say feeling the vibe of ppl reacting in certain ways doesn't sometimes affect me negatively in the cinema - grimmest example of this was some old chuckling appreciatively as the protagonist of "Thunder Road" berated the corpse of his drug addict ex-wife.
― Daniel_Rf, Wednesday, 18 October 2023 13:38 (six months ago) link