Last (x) movies you saw

Phantom of the Paradise (De Palma): BEST MOVIE.

Telephone Thing- It takes a lot more creeping than that to creep me out. If I hadn't seen you mention PotLiB at both her tumblr and here I might not have picked up the film (which has still to come in the post), one enthusiast can make all the difference.

Another film I've been praising on the horror threads is Panna A Netvor, the very beautiful Juraj Herz version of Beauty And The Beast. If anyone has a major thing for gothic film scenery, this is a must.

My favorite version of "Beauty And The Beast"! Gorgeous and nightmarish.

That sounds awesome- I loved The Cremator (and Morgiana is on my to-watch list as soon as I can find a way to do it on the cheap), Cocteau's B&tB is one of my favorite films of all time, and I love me some castles and candelabras.

balls out: the gary houseman story (leinier, 2009) 6/10
penumbra (bogliano, 2012) 6/10
brimstone and treacle (davis, 1976) 8/10
blade on the feather (loncraine, 1980) 8/10
nebraska (payne, 2013) 7/10
jodorowsky's dune (pavich, 2013) 7/10

The Amazing Spider-Man 2 (Webb, 2014) 5/10
X-Men Days of Future Past (Singer, 2014) 6/10
Godzilla 3D (Roberts, 2014) 4/10
Je Tu Il Elle (Akerman, 1974) 8/10
Stray Dogs (Tsai, 2013) 8/10

Ace in the Hole (Wilder, 1951) 7/10
The Great Dictator (Chaplin, 1940) 6/10
The Music Room (Ray, 1958) 8/10
The Abominable Dr Phibes (Fuest, 1971) 7/10

Twilight ('98 Robert Benton movie 6/10)

I caught a sneak screening of this back then, and was worried one of the 70ish stars would break a hip in the final shootout.

*The Best Years of Our Lives (1946, Wyler) 9/10
Night Moves (2013, Reichardt) 7/10
*Fists in the Pocket (1965, Bellocchio) 8/10
Amarilly of Clothes-Line Alley (1918, Neilan/Pickford) 6/10
Claire Dolan (1998, Kerrigan) 7/10
A Run for Your Money (1949, Frend) 6/10
The Card (1952, Neame) 7/10
We Still Kill the Old Way (1967, Petri) 6/10
*Dead Ringers (1988, Cronenberg) 8/10
Ms. 45 (1981, Ferrara) 5/10
Ida (2013, Pawlikowski) 6/10
Test (2013, Johnson) 6/10
The Captain's Paradise (1953, Kimmins) 6/10
Norte, the End of History (2013, Diaz, slept some) 7/10
*Aguirre: The Wrath of God (1972, Herzog) 10/10
Stage Fright (1950, Hitchcock) 6/10
The New Centurions (1972, Fleischer) 6/10
The Breaking Point (1950, Curtiz) 8/10
Exhibition (2014, Hogg) 8/10

The Internet's Own Boy: The Story of Aaron Swartz: Somewhat ashamed that I knew pretty much nothing about him. (I vaguely remember a Sullivan post when he died.) An ILX search didn't turn up more than a handful of posts and no threads. Conventional as a film, but quite a story. Would love to show it to students, but three or four fleeting bits of profanity rule that out (one of them, I wouldn't be able to work around). Would have preferred less crying at the end--just a thing with me.

Lego movie really surprised me. I hadn't read the hype or anyhting at that point so I just watched it, and I especially like what they did at the end with the dad/son dynamic

Norte, the End of History (2013, Diaz, slept some) 7/10

lol u old.

sleep-deprived from meds too

Jokes etc.

Looking forward to that film in a couple of weeks.

The Driver (8/10)
Pina (7/10)
Story Of Floating Weeds (1959) ( 9/10)

Twilight ('98 Robert Benton movie 6/10)

I caught a sneak screening of this back then, and was worried one of the 70ish stars would break a hip in the final shootout.

― son of a lewd monk (Dr Morbius

The plot is more rickety than their hips, but the duets between Garner and Newman, and Newman and Hackman are marvelous. And was this the last time Susan Sarandon was watchable?

Maniac Cop (Lustig)- This was my first Bill Lustig movie, a man I really only know for running Blue Underground and directing four separate movies with "Maniac" in the title, but I've heard good things about Maniac Cop 2, I'm curious about the upcoming Refn-produced remake, and I love everything I've seen from Larry Cohen so I figured I'd rent this and see what was up. And it's quite good for what it is! Obviously I can't really tell what Lustig brings to the table (though from reviews of Maniac, I suspect that he toned down his grimy, horrific portrayal of pre-Giuliani NYC for this), but Cohen's fingerprints are all over it- it's an exemplary low-budget high-concept movie of the kind he's justly famous for. My only major qualm (aside from a couple of creaky performances and the weirdness of seeing Robert Z'Dar and his costar, Robert Z'Dar's Chin, in a "real" movie and not something like Future War or Soultaker) is that it doesn't take that high concept far enough. It gets that part of what's scary about the idea of a killer cop is that victims would trust him and run right to him, but abandons this fairly quickly (the script wastes little time having the lead cop agonize over breaking the news and moves right on to the public anti-cop backlash). Far scarier, at least to me, is the institutional power a cop represents and the scope for abuse, and with the killer operating (mostly) outside the police department, he only passively benefits from their unwillingness to believe one of their own could be responsible. And, okay, I'm a little confused as to whether Matt Cordell is supposed to be a half-dead brain-damaged monster or outright undead, but to anyone born in the 80's it's easy enough to shrug it off; he is, after all, A Jason (as distinct from A Frankenstein, A Dracula, etc). Good times.

The Legend of Hell House (Hough)- I went into this a bit underprepared. Though I've read about it endlessly and even own it on DVD, I haven't yet seen Robert Wise's The Haunting, the haunted house picture to which this and all others are inevitably compared. It's serviceable, has some excellent sets and locations (those exterior shots of the house in foggy daylight are wonderful) and I can't say enough about the sound design, which does more for the overall effect than any other element. The music is mostly subservient to ominous radiophonic droning from Delia Derbyshire, and the ghostly whispers are a particularly high-quality example of this kind of thing- mixed low enough in the soundtrack that they feel truly insidious, and to my ear sounding like they're whispered while sucking in a breath (try this, it sounds awful). The problem is it's just not scary at all. Roddy McDowall is a tremendous ham, the script (which feels like it was heavily condensed by Matheson from his novel) starts out removing any doubt about the existence of supernatural phenomena, reducing the characters' research to an explanatory footnote under HOLY SHIT ECTOPLASM AND TELEKINESIS ARE REAL, the resolution is bizarre and outright laughable, and if there's one thing I wish horror directors would learn it is this: cats are not scary. Cats have never been scary, and cats never will be scary.

Nightmares in Red, White and Blue (Monument)- Meh. This is pretty perfunctory stuff, going through most of the high points in American horror in chronological order, making superficial connections to the American political climate at the time they were made (hey guys, did you know that Dawn of the Dead is about 80's consumerism?), glossing over some of the most interesting and obscure material in favor of points everyone's heard a thousand times about, say, The Exorcist, and just generally falling between two stools- it's too basic for most horror fans, and too fast-paced and too reliant on commentary from cult figures (and some unknowns and marginal hacks) to really interest a newcomer to the genre. And about that commentary- John Carpenter and George Romero, god bless them, aren't exactly reclusive or tight-lipped, so why not let them talk for more than ten seconds at a time? The only point where it really shows any life is a Youtube-level supercut of violence and nudity from the Friday the 13th franchise. It ends with a similar quick-cut montage of unattributed highlights from international horror movies, but does almost nothing to lay out what makes American horror films different from other countries' horror cinema. Really disappointing.

*Sid & Nancy (Cox)
*Repo Man (Cox)- This was a double feature at Philly's Trocadero. $3 admission, a free beer, fucking terrible sound and an enthusiastic audience, which is about right for these two. I still feel kind of ambivalent about Sid & Nancy (I hate that audiences always end up laughing at Chloe Webb's Nancy, which is a tremendously brave and sad performance that's easily the best thing in the film, more deserving of praise than Oldman's Sid Vicious) but Repo Man is literally perfect in every way.

A Very British Psycho (Rodley)- a BBC4 documentary on Peeping Tom from 1997. This (and the Ultimate Performance doc on Donald Cammell) are how you do it- plenty of access to the subject, well-chosen interviewees, and a good throughline to hold it together. This is more about the life and career (artistic and otherwise) of writer Leo Marks, which was a perfect choice, because the guy (still alive at the time of filming) was utterly fascinating. It left me wanting to seek out not just his autobiography, which he finished after this aired, but Twisted Nerve (yes, the one with the Bernard Herrmann whistling), his other major screen credit.

(parentheses)

Obsession (De Palma)- Disappointing. De Palma, Vilmos Zsigmond, or some combination of the two make the bizarre decision to shoot the entire film with gauzy, vaseline-y diffuse lighting, which along with Herrmann's beautiful but overused score and a shocking lack of humor for a De Palma project (I blame Schrader) makes it just draaag. Cliff Robertson is a sour, crusty nonentity, Jon Lithgow should have been allowed at most two of his affectations (Foghorn Leghorn accent, seersucker suit, ridiculous mustache), and Genevieve Bujold is wonderful but can't do anything about the pace or disturbingly tasteful nature of the movie. Having read the screenplay, I think De Palma did the right thing by excising Schrader's third act and abridging the picture where he did, but if he'd left in some of the nastier elements it would have at least had a little more texture to it. I do want to call out the last scene, which is fucking amazing- the flicker of fluorescent lights on slow-motion film (I don't think this could be done digitally, at least not naturally in-camera as a byproduct of the process) is beautiful.

All About Eve (Mankiewicz)- This floored me. So wonderfully arch and acidic and nasty that I was genuinely shocked by the places it was willing to go. The second film I've seen George Sanders in recently; I liked him bringing the (low-key, genteel) sleaze in Rebecca but he's perfect in this. I probably don't need to say anything about Bette Davis beyond "I'm an idiot for not seeking out her movies sooner, holy shit."

The Whip and the Body (Bava)- Oh dear :( I wanted to like this so much- Bava's first feature-length gothic in full color, with Christopher Lee and some mild but daring for the time kink- but the script is just not there. After an opening shot I loved and would steal in a heartbeat if I were a filmmaker myself (the rusty dagger rattling under its bell jar) it dumps a huge chunk of exposition on us, gives us no time to work out the relationships between characters (there's a little of this close to the hour mark, but by then it's too late), and sets about doing nothing at all save for some Scooby-Doo tomb-skulking bullshit for most of its running time. Christopher Lee is dependably menacing because of course he is, he's Christopher goddamn Lee, but the English dub doesn't even feature his voice, and the nominal hero is just useless, even more so than in most Italian genre films, or Corman Poe gothics (which this definitely resembles).

Work completely consumed the 2nd half of June for me. Nothing but --

The Red Balloon (Lamorisse, 1956)
Stranger by the Lake (Guiraudie, 2013)

talked to a guy who reminded me of the stranger by the lake, felt intense
what'd you think, william?

I liked it a lot! No other coherent thoughts on it than that, really. This bit from Alfred's review -- "He doesn’t know how to frame an uninteresting shot. His rhythms are impeccable." -- is OTM.

Never Let Me Go (7.0)
Ida (6.0)
Old Enough (6.5)
Palo Alto (6.5)
Deal (3.5)
A Short Film about Killing (6.0)
Pather Panchali (10.0)
Aparajito (8.0)
The World of Apu (9.0)
Stonebrook (4.0)

Je t'aime, je t'aime (1968; 4.5/5)
The Wrong Man (1956; 4/5)
Gimme the Loot (2012; 3.5/5)
A Field in England (2013; 2.5/5)
Obvious Child (2014; 3.5/5)
Harry Dean Stanton: Partly Fiction (2012; 3/5)
They Came Together (2014; 3.5/5)
The Unknown Known (2014; 2.5/5)
Quay des Orfevres (1947; rewatch; 4/5)

*The President's Analyst (Flicker)- one of my favorites; I am unshakeable in my belief that this is an unfairly neglected classic
Top Secret! (Zucker/Abrahams/Zucker)- how can the people responsible for Airplane! have made this wretched thing
*A Hard Day's Night (Lester)
Les Dents du Singe (Laloux)
Les Temps Morts (Laloux)
*Les Escargots (Laloux)

The President's Analyst is an all time great

The Happening (deleted scenes on the DVD are good)
The Dance Of Reality
Restrepo

*The Naked Gun: From the Files of Police Squad! (Zucker)
*Ravenous (Bird)
*Dr. No (Young)

Mahler by Ken Russell. Good fun, I thought this was going to be one of his more straight films.

And it's not? That's heartening, especially since it's one of the unannounced films floating around on Criterion's Hulu channel (crossing my fingers for a rerelease soon)...

I would say Women In Love, The Rainbow and Altered States are his straight films. I thought Mahler would be like that but it has lots of comedy, but there is beautiful moments too.
It did look like it needed a restored edition though, a slightly rough print. I'd imagine the Criterion version will do that.

Manji by Masumura. Quite strange and interesting but I didn't really buy the passion and obsession of the characters, the whole thing just didn't seem that convincing, but I lost track of a lot of the plot quite early. I liked Blind Beast way more even if the evolution of the girl's feelings in that was a bit questionable too.

The DVD had a trailer for Pistol Opera, which looked pretty good.

Smiles of a Summer Night (Bergman, 1955)
The Great Beauty (Sorrentino, 2013)
Yoyo (Etaix, 1965)

*Alien (Scott) (original theatrical cut)- It's Alien, what else do I need to say? It's been a while, though, and I forgot just how graceful and spooky Goldsmith's score is, or those roaming borderline Kubrickian Steadicam shots early on. Good stuff.

Batman (Burton)- technically I have seen this before, but it was as a five-year-old during the original theatrical run so I count it as a first watch. I LOVE THIS BIG DUMB MOVIE. So many great little things- Miller from Repo Man as the Joker's number one guy, the museum sequence with Prince's "Partyman" and the Bacon screaming pope, some fucking weird dialog (the aforementioned NUMBER...ONE...ah-GUY, "Never rub another man's rhubarb," "LET'S GET NUTS," Robert Wuhl's "I am too a 40's newspaperman you guys" voice). Love it to bits.

Mikey and Nicky (May)- My first Elaine May film except for, as it turns out, Labyrinth (she's an uncredited co-writer; I'm not sure if that's a full collaboration or as a script doctor). Not a million miles off from the Cassavetes films I've seen (Faces and Shadows), which is hardly an accident, though more purely entertaining than either thanks to a plot and a really well-matched pair of central characters. I will always enjoy watching Cassavetes be a total bastard, and Peter Falk just being Peter Falk. The Philly location didn't do as much for me as I'd hoped (it's during the Rizzo years in parts of South Philly I'm not familiar with, though I recognized street names), though the mob hitman's gripe that there's no parking anywhere in the city got a laugh from the audience. And for a movie that went this far over budget from a director with such a reputation as a perfectionist, you'd think the sound mixing wouldn't be borderline inaudible most of the time...

*Aliens (Cameron) (original theatrical cut)- The best big dumb superficial popcorn movie of all time. There's not a lot going on upstairs, but it respects the original film and its audience, which is stupidly rare for a big-budget sequel. And for the designated "action movie" entry in the series, I find the sequence in the infirmary with the two loose facehuggers the most outright scary thing in any of the movies.

*Kwaidan (Kobayashi)- One of my favorites, but seldom rewatched because one, it's long as hell, and two, it always takes me a while to get into this movie's headspace- I think it's an odd choice on Kobayashi's part to start the film with the most static, least colorful segment. But everything else is wonderful, especially those matte painting skies in "The Woman of the Snow" and the sea battles and biwa in "Hoichi the Earless."

*From Russia With Love (Young)- I had thought of this as my favorite Bond film, but it might be slipping, somehow. For whatever reason I enjoyed Dr. No more on this latest round of rewatching- probably because for all its budgetary limitations, it gives the production designer Ken Adam more to do instead of relying on (admittedly gorgeous) location photography of Istanbul. It does still have one of the best sets of villains in Bond history, between the unseen Blofeld, Kronsteen, Rosa Klebb (homophobia aside; Lotte Lenya tho) and Donald Grant.

Alien 3, or Alien Cubed or whatever (Fincher) (original theatrical cut)- I kind of liked this? I feel guilty saying it, since the script is a total hash, Fincher stopped giving a shit at some point, and it blatantly cheats the audience (how did that egg get on the Sulaco? when did Ripley get impregnated with the queen?) before promptly punching it in the dick with the deaths of Newt, Hicks and Bishop, but it's so downtrodden and miserable and resolutely final (of course that didn't last) that I can't help but admire the good ideas and performances that did make it through. And anyway I have a thing for girls with shaved heads, so I'll spot it a half point for that.

*Batman (Tim Burton commentary)- Tim Burton is a twitchy, mumbly weirdo, surprise surprise. An awfully nice-seeming one, though, and he doesn't seem to buy into his own hype or his increasingly-curdled brand of kitschy, whimsical shit (I think this was recorded in the early or mid-2000s; the disc doesn't say)- this is mostly down-to-earth stuff about the realities of a big studio production and detail-light chat about the collaboration with the production team and directing actors (and the second or third story I've heard from a film professional about being scared shitless by an inexplicably hostile Jack Palance).

Mikey and Nicky needs to become available so I can finally see it. I love Peter Falk being Peter Falk.

*On Her Majesty's Secret Service (Peter R. Hunt, 1969) - Aside from the plank-like charmlessness, Lazenby isn't bad enough to ruin an intriguing, if slightly uneven and occasionally potty installment to the franchise. And, queasy sexism aside, Diana Rigg's character is one of the stronger Bond girls. 7/10

Seven Samurai (Kurosawa, 1957) - Perfectly paced, surprisingly light-hearted and thoroughly gripping. The eventual battle sequences, kinetically filled with spattering mud and glinting rain, are brilliantly staged. 10/10

*Gravity (Curon, 2013) - "You gotta admit one thing - you can't beat the view" 7/10

Bonjour Tristesse (Preminger, 1958) - The film excels with Preminger's graceful shots of the wonderful landscape of beaches, woodland and the dazzling blue of the Mediterranean. Despite that it's all about sex, the film just isn't sexy. The ending is beautifully bleak, but the rest is campy melodrama that hasn't aged well. 6/10

X-Men: Days of Future Past (Singer, 2014) - I want the red jacket Michael Fassbender wears. 6/10

The Right Stuff (Kaufman, 1983) - I like that it was filmed like a western. Nicely undercuts its own patriotic soaring grandeur with flip humour and a satiric edge. 8/10

Late Spring (Ozu, 1949) - "Why can't things stay as they are?" 9/10

*Scanners (Cronenberg, 1981) - My head hurts. 7/10

Edge of Tomorrow (Liman, 2014) - The most consistently entertaining blockbuster of the year, so far. The marrying of the Groundhog Day concept to Starship Troopers and Aliens, giving the film a beat-the-video-game feel, works well. 7/10

*Do the Right Thing (Lee, 1989) - I could have done with more of the three middle-aged guys sitting under the parasol trash-talking one another. 7/10

White Dog (Fuller, 1982) - Lurid but effective. 7/10

*Gregory's Girl (Forsythe, 1981) - The film's setting of a newly-built housing estate in the late 70s/early 80s, with its clean, freshly tarmacked roads and lines of thin, newly planted saplings is very familiar to me and did set off all sorts of nostalgia alarms. That helped the film endear itself to me some more, but in the end the film is gentle, sweet, but perhaps just a bit too slight. 6/10

*Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure (Stephen Herek, 1989) - A bodacious on screen portrayal of Napoleon, or the MOST bodacious on screen portrayal of Napoleon? 8/10

*The Lost Weekend (Wilder, 1945) - One of the best things about the Masters of Cinema Blu-ray release is that you get Alex Cox introducing the film in the style of his old Moviedrome episodes. 9/10

Wake in Fright (Ted Kotcheff, 1971) - Question: Which film contains the most beer drinking? Answer: This one, probably. Really striking Aussie psychodrama, and it made a nice booze-fuelled tailspin double bill with Lost Weekend. The Blu-ray restoration is top notch, and does justice to the film's vivid colour palette of burnt orange, deep sky blue and ochre. The sweat, dust and dizzying heat and light are palpable. 9/10

A Story of Children and Film (Cousins, 2014) - Mark Cousins sleepily narrates his way through a great selection of movie clips to show how children and their lives have been well served by cinema, all over the world. 6/10

Sullivan's Travels (Sturges, 1941) - Not sure if the odd mix of light screwball romantic comedy, very broad pratfall gags and gloomy social statement blended together perfectly. Veronica Lake is great, though. 6/10

Lifeboat (Hitchcock, 1944) - Hitch's best and cleverest cameo. 7/10

Wake In Fright is amazing.

Telephone Thing- I finally watched Perfume Of The Lady In Black, but I written about it in the old horror thread.

Glad you enjoyed it. I really need to catch up on that thread; the post-2006 thread kind of lost me because I don't go out to wide-release movies very often and it takes FOREVER for new stuff to hit Netflix, or even a reasonable $1.99 rental through Amazon.

That tracking shot stuck out at me as well, along with one other detail that really bothered me- in the scenes where the "conspirators" are disembarking from cars at the abandoned tunnel mouth, they're lit by an incredibly obvious spotlight that's just so jarringly unnatural I have to assume the director and DP meant for it to stick out like that. So weird.

*Naked Gun 2 1/2: The Smell of Fear (Zucker): 's ok
*Alien Resurrection (Jeunet): shit sandwich

Camille Claudel 1915 (Bruno Dumont, 2013) - Catholicism, long takes, the struggle of the inner mind. A tough watch -- mentally ill 'actors' were (ugh I can't find a better word right now) 'deployed' to effect but there is a sensitivity on hand too.

Possibly the only director in France doing something interesting these days (apart from JLG)

Golden Eighties (Chantal Akerman, 1985) - this was a musical, w/not much irony that I could detect. She does tap into the raw emotions of relationships that drives the romantic stories that form the basis of the musical. Some of the music is good (oh the much maligned genre of French pop needs a revisit!) and the gags work. Odd lull aside when there didn't seem to be a song for about 20 mins, seemed unbalanced, not that I was timekeeping.

Akerman had to get away from Jeanne Dielman but its complicated. There is a scene where the girl dragged by her mum does not want to buy a dress and wants to keep wearing jeans instead (echoes of Chantal). A scene with the phone has echoes of Toute Une Nuit. One the storylines reunites a couple who fell in and out of love and are now older (and perhaps) wiser.

Bought Blu-Rays of two of my favorite Walter Hill movies, Hard Times and Southern Comfort, so watched those this week. Hard Times is so minimal it barely exists as a story—guy comes to town, makes some money punching people in the head, gets his patron out of trouble, leaves town. Southern Comfort is almost as stripped-down. A bunch of National Guard buffoons head into the Louisiana swamps to play Army, get into some shit with the locals and are hunted and killed for 90 minutes. But Hill's ability to understand male group dynamics in all their fucked-upness without romanticizing or condemning them is both underappreciated and rare. Plus, his efficient, minimalist style perfectly serves his material; he never over-stylizes a shot when he can just show you what's happening and have that be more than enough. The Southern Comfort Blu-Ray actually has an interview with Hill, which is extremely uncommon—he supposedly hates talking about his past work. I'm definitely gonna check that out.

The Naked Gun 2 1/2: The Smell of Fear (Zucker)- The very last decent Zucker/Abrahams/Zucker film, and even then a pretty big step down. The one where Leslie Nielsen starts pulling exaggerated reaction shots and mugging for the camera.

Prometheus (Scott)- This movie has an unbelievably poor script for such a high-profile release (fuck you, Damon Lindelof) and the otherwise magnificent visuals are let down by some really heavy-handed color correction (though at least blue and gold is slightly more tolerable than orange and teal; still an appallingly lazy way to construct a color palette) but I can't help but like it a little anyway despite almost everything about it. Mostly Fassbender, I think; that opening section where he's the only one awake on the spaceship is easily the best part of the film. I could go talk about this movie's woes for ages, but there are two things I have to say: Charlize Theron's character is almost comically pointless, and Guy Pearce is terrible at playing old (not that he's helped by a terrible makeup job). For fuck's sake, why not just hire an older actor? Young Weyland doesn't even appear in the movie proper, just in a promotional video, and even then they could (should!) have just hired a different, younger actor and accomplished the illusion of them being the same person with fucking acting. Argh.

*Planete Sauvage (Laloux)- One of the best science fiction films of the seventies, and one of my favorite animated movies ever. It's a real shame Roland Topor didn't work more in animation, because his designs are so striking and so wonderfully executed here. And Alain Goraguer's soundtrack is one of my favorite film scores of all time.

Flesh for Frankenstein (Morrissey)- On the one hand, it's a lumpy script, the locations (or at least how Morrissey used them) look undeniably cheap, the tone wanders all over the place, and while it's not really fair to judge them in the context of a home DVD screening, almost all of the obvious 3D effects shots are pointless even for 3D effects. On the other hand, Udo Kier. Screaming tantrums, YOU FILTHY THING!, the infamous gall bladder line, the way he pronounces "zumbie," everything. And since it was produced in Italy, there's Nicoletta Elmi as a creepy child.

Fast Company (Cronenberg)- The earliest of all "I wish he'd go back to horror" Cronenberg movies, though it's a much bigger outlier than his later films. His enthusiasm for motorsports really shows, which helps draw in viewers like me who couldn't possibly give less of a shit, there are some interesting close-up shots of engines and drivers in goggles and filter masks, and an early mildly kinky sex scene with two hitchhikers and a can of motor oil, but it's thoroughly minor Cronenberg. If this wasn't so very Canadian I would expect to see Roger Corman's name in the credits somewhere.

*Scanners (Cronenberg)- This is more like it yes. There's a good deal of complaining online about the new color timing on Criterion's release (some people are going the George Lucas/Steven Spielberg hyperbole route, though I think the most accurate comparison would be what William Friedkin did to the original blu-ray of The French Connection) but it looks wonderful, and barring a comparison to the original prints, which I'm probably never going to see (who revives Scanners in 35mm anymore?) the best it's ever going to look.

I very near picked up Scanners when I was browsing at the B&N 50% off sale the other day. Might still get it.

Just to clarify: I don't think the Scanners situation is like the French Connection debacle at all (that film was legit ruined), I just meant it was the right kind of comparison, not the Star Wars special edition/ET rerelease hyperventilating I've read.

on preview: You should totally do it! The lack of a commentary is disappointing, since Cronenberg does it so well and he's been game on previous Criterion releases, but the other extras are really well-produced, especially the documentary about the practical effects.

I just got Scanners in the mail, along with Alex Cox's Walker and Revenger's Tragedy. Gonna watch one of those tonight for sure.

flesh for frankenstein is incred

Spring Breakers (Korine 2012)
Attack of the 50 Foot Woman (Juran 1958)
Last Year at Marienbad (Resnais 1961)
*A Hard Day's Night (Lester 1964) - the one I did pick up at B&N
Good Morning (Ozu 1959)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cp8IU1PcThQ

I haven't seen this talked about yet. Roughly 10min Cronenberg film on youtube (fully authorized) for a limited time. Body horror in the form of one conversation about getting a breast removed for an odd reason. Cronenberg plays the doctor.

I think it's fine. Not much to say about it.

I haven't watched it yet (probably will tonight, thanks for the reminder) but it's worth remembering that it's not really a complete thing in and of itself- it's a prequel/teaser for his debut novel out in a few months.

Guy Pearce is terrible at playing old (not that he's helped by a terrible makeup job). For fuck's sake, why not just hire an older actor? Young Weyland doesn't even appear in the movie proper, just in a promotional video, and even then they could (should!) have just hired a different, younger actor and accomplished the illusion of them being the same person with fucking acting. Argh.

The script had scenes with young Weyland that got removed after production began.

Rise of the Planet of the Apes (Rupert Wyatt, 2011) - on tv last night. Meant to enjoy the 'NOOO!'. There should've been a commie salute inserted somewhere too as I detected a revolutionary situ coming along...come on apes, arms held straight and out, fists closed..lets have a sense of humour about it all.

Maybe that Cronenberg novel is the Fly sequel that was being talked about?