The Archers (Powell & Pressburger): S/D

eric portman is great as a nazi. and it has laurence olivier as a french-canadian fur trapper. do you need a higher recommendation?

A critical roundup marking the Criterion BluRay and the new 4K digital restoration of Black Narcissus, which I would see at Film Forum if I didn't know there'll be shitheads laughing all the way through.

http://www.fandor.com/blog/daily-powell-and-pressburgers-black-narcissus

laughing because of the colonial (and other) stereotypes?

one glare from kathleen byron shld silence the gigglers:

http://www.independent.co.uk/migration_catalog/article5119886.ece/ALTERNATES/w460/kathleen-byron.jpeg

There is a hardcore group of under-35s in NYC who go to old films simply to laugh condescendingly at them. For any reason.

The resto of Colonel Blimp is out on disc in March I think.

xp I think I've told this here before. I went to see All That Heaven Allows and throughout people were laughing at some of the (non-funny) dialog. Some woman shouted out, "This is not a comedy! Why don't you all go home and watch television!" Which shut everyone up for the rest of the movie. Later, there's a shocking scene at which point she adds, "Not so funny now is it?!"

Haha. Bravo!

hero

<333

that is a fantastic story, fit and working again (wld happily buy a volume of ppl's cinema-going stories, anecdotes etc)

in a nice piece of synchronicity, i'm planning to spend the weekend w/ a sirk collection before lending it to a friend - looking at the set, i realised i'd never seen Magnificent Obsession, and can always re-watch All That Heaven Allows (my favourite)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=Cjv755LkaIE#!

^Scorsese on Col Blimp restoration

print looked fabulous

Thanks. Near the end it sounded like he said that "The Great Lebowski" contributed to the restoration.

A little of John Sweet goes a long way, and the last third dawdles, but what an atmosphere A Canterbury Tale evokes, no? It's like Thomas Hardy shot by Altman.

Saw Gone to Earth tonight, with Thelma Schoonmaker introducing it; not exactly a masterpiece but the cinematography is incredible, and Jennifer Jones is quite good. The introduction included some very depressing stories about Jones' marriage to David Selznick, and apparently Jones and Cyril Cusack almost ran away together after they finished the film.

Schoonmaker mentioned (in her response to a question of mine) that there was some Who's Who book in which Powell claimed that his favorite hobby was "leaning on gates."

foxy! foxy!

i enjoyed this quite a bit, some of it is almost too much to take but that's OK w/ me.

i've never seen the selznick-edited version, am curious about that.

Contraband is def the Archers film for your discerning bondage enthusiast.

Forgot to mention, my main thought while watching Gone to Earth was "this must be Kate Bush's favorite movie."

watched the Life and Death of Colonel Blimp at the weekend... i have a question...

Theo blanks him in the POW camp. why? pride?

but then he calls him from the railway station and goes and has dinner with him. seems friendly enough.

but then seems to mock him to his compatriots on the train back to germany.

why the flip-flopping?

Feels he can't let on to his countrymen that he has an English friend.

um, i guess. but wouldn't the phone call and the invitation have tipped off the other germans? he also seemed a bit sniffy at the dinner party itself (that said, the other guests did seem a bit haughty themselves).

i think he's violently conflicted--torn between anger at what has been to done to his country and loyalty to his friend. i do think this is one aspect of the film that seems a bit miscalculated. one reason this has never been my favorite archer film even though it is completely enthralling front to back.

i should clarify: he's pissed off by the reparations exacted by the victors of WWI, and the way col. blimp and his buddies seem oblivious to that. i think we're supposed to see this partly through Theo's eyes, to recognize the casual cruelty of the English officers' jovial tone.

that is of course a political statement -- a hint that britain (and france etc) might be partially responsible for the route Germany took in the 20 years after WWI. I think maybe this was one of several things that angered Churchill et al at the time of the film's held-up release.

makes sense. i guess he was very nationalistic, at least until the nazis destroyed that (and his family). but, like you say, it does seem a bit odd.

canterbury tales next (working through that 11 dvd box, mingled in with japanese film backlog (6 left, must buy more), ST:TOS and Office series 8. i think there are only 3 in there that i haven't already seen but i'm enjoying revisiting them all anyway)

plenty of weirdo nationalism in Canterbury Tale too

canterbury tale is nothing if not weird. i wouldn't call the species of nationalism in it particularly weird, though. it's founded on a notion of the countryside--or at least provincial life--as being the backbone of English national character. ian christie has a great article about that film in an edited volume of essays on Powell.

it's about 5 films in one for one thing (i think markS made this point YEARS ago)

and the way there are kids playing in a boat on a lake without adult supervision is a bit o_O to us these days (see also ealing comedies with kids playing in bombed out houses or building sites. and swallows and amazons.)

i love that part of it. the kids have the run of the town.

the ending (or the last act) of that film consistently makes me cry like a baby btw.

Reading Herzog on Herzog at the moment and he points out how great war-ravaged cities are for kids:

It might sound bizarre to people today, but things like our discovery of the arms cache made for a wonderful childhood. Everyone thinks that growing up in the ruins of the cities was a terrible experience, and for the parents who lost absolutely everything I have no doubt that it was. But for the children it truly was the most marvellous of times. Kids in the cities took over whole bombed-out blocks and would declare the remnants of buildings their own to play in where great adventures were acted out. You really do not have to commiserate with these kids. Everyone I know who spent their early childhood in the ruins of post-war Germany raves about that time. It was anarchy in the best sense of the word. There were no ruling fathers around and no rules to follow. We had to invent everything from scratch

i wouldn't call the species of nationalism in it particularly weird, though

riffing on (almost literally) "blood and soil" in a WWII "propaganda movie" is, if not weird, all kinds of interesting to me

glue and soil

Reading Herzog on Herzog at the moment and he points out how great war-ravaged cities are for kids:

John Boorman's film "Hope and Glory" gets this across pretty well, if I recall.

glue and soil

― Ward Fowler, Friday, April 11, 2014 6:56 AM (6 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

"glue"

a 12ft hayrick on a cart with a boy stood on top of it.

more bombed out buildings.

more endings than lotr3.

oh, and charles hawtrey is the railway station attendant.

Slowly working through the box set. Ill met, river plate and today They're a Weird Mob which was strange in a similar way to Canterbury tale in that it wasn't really one type of film but several.

Also, not many real actors, they seem like amateurs.

Is the blind chap who is in nearly all their films in those. Having trouble remember his name, suppose I should just scroll up, Evelyn Knight or something?

Close, Esmond Knight.

IMDb days no. Black NARC next though and he's in that. Will keep an eye out.

(Says)

Will keep an eye out.
*groans*

Is anyone aware of any really strong essays on The Thief of Bagdad? I need some supplementary material to give to my class when I show the film at the end of October.

there's this one from Criterion

http://www.criterion.com/current/posts/496-the-thief-of-bagdad-arabian-fantasies

Excited about the Tales of Hoffmann restoration:

http://www.bfi.org.uk/news-opinion/news-bfi/features/tales-hoffmann-exclusive-materials-making-powell-pressburger-masterpiece

Nice!

nice indeed, but still waiting for bluebeard's castle :)

Spotted this in Marylebone when I was down in London at the weekend:

http://i1194.photobucket.com/albums/aa362/Andrew_Littlefield/P1010457_zpsd79f9259.jpg

http://www.theguardian.com/film/2014/feb/17/english-heritage-blue-plaque-archers-scorsese

nice!

a few of these guys' movies are my favorite things ever

canterbury tale
small back room
matter of life and death
49th parallel (particularly the last reel)