what cool movies have you been watching recently? i'll start.
les abysses, aka the depths, by nikos papatakis. based on the IRL case of the papin sisters in france. utterly bleak and immiserating movie. some of the grimiest and yuckiest sets i've ever seen in a 60s film. more of the dialogue is screamed than it's actually spoken. easily one of my fav first watches of the year. was very cathartic to attend a screening immediately after a nightmare retail shift.
sounds awesome, ill have to add it to my list
recently we've seen:
chimes at midnight (rewatch for me, fantastic film, had no idea welles tricked his first producer by telling him he was gonna to use the money to film treasure island)
austin powers (rewatch, wife did not find it groovy)
macbeth 1948 (first time watching, great performances all around, also wonderfully grim lighting)
the northman (first watch, eggers is hit or miss for me and i didnt like this one. i appreciate the attention to detail but it just felt totally unsuited to film as a medium)
>>3mr4nxo3pcy2o
yeaaaaa macbeth 48 is so good! i really really love the scary lighting and austere, threatening set design. chimes at midnight is another one i really need to see (that treasure island tidbit is really funny too lol)
eggers is also very hit or miss for me, but surprisingly the northman is one of his films i enjoyed more. though mostly bcuz it was more like a blockbuster action flick w/ historical flavouring than a typical eggers film. "unsuited for the medium" is an apt way of describing how i feel about all his stuff tbh.
just rewatched cube, fun movie fun gore, the sequels are silly but also fun
last couple movies ive watched are
- the prestige, it was fun i like the twist, i dont normally love nolan but this was fun
- bring it on, i wish it was more political it opens w really interesting thoughts about race and class and then just doesnt rly engage
- the sheep detectives, fun kiddy murder mystery but i wish it was slightly less catholic
>>3mrixq5azws2c
cube is such a great flick. i remember watching it with a few friends in college and it captivated us so thoroughly we immediately queued up cube 2 hypercube. probably the biggest let down of my life up to that point
>>3mrjc5kr6gj25
yeah its a letdown i appreciate with hypercube and such the wackiness kind of makes up for any disappointment
>>3mr4nxo3pcy2o
>the northman (first watch, eggers is hit or miss for me and i didnt like this one. i appreciate the attention to detail but it just felt totally unsuited to film as a medium)
i feel like the northman is kind of a reddit history memes movie but i don't want to make anyone feel bad for liking it smiles
when i watched it for the second time i just couldn't get it out of my head that it felt so chuddy, and it made me start thinking that eggers makes kind of conservative stories even though he's probably some type of liberal. i rly like the vvitch but it kind of plays a good vs evil story with corruption horror pretty straight, like the forces of corruptive evil do win in the end but to me that comes off even more conservative in some ways haha. i think the vvitch is a good conservative story though.
recently i saw a pedro costa short i'd never seen, tarrafal (2007), in preparation for a local screening of his incredible, haunted/haunting feature colossal youth (2006) at the end of august, and my friend kelley dong showed me his new short, letter to sirius, which was gorgeous and inspiring. i'm also still intermittently poking at my essay on mizoguchi's genroku chushingura/the 47 ronin (1941) which i watched at the beginning of the month, i'm trying to tease out how its style fosters a non-cathartic critical reflexivity that runs counter to its dictated role as wartime propaganda.
>>3ms2w4w7z7a2z
would love to read that essay if/when u finish it, i need to get around to the 47 ronin at some point
we rewatched the phantom menace last night. i probably havent seen in it about 20 years and honestly was sort of expecting to enjoy it (perhaps im too susceptible to critical re-evaluations). anyway it was dogshit. pretty much every decision the film makes (from line-reads to blocking to pacing) is totally baffling, but theres way too much tie-in merchandise pandering for it to feel intentionally alienating, its just two hours of bad acting and windows vista screensavers
>>3ms2svivt572c
yeah wrt the northman i think that the point of the film's narrative is basically "death and disaster are the natural consequences of a culture that prizes honor above all else" whereas the visual language the movie uses to depict amleth's subconcious is like "epic credit card commerical for the white birth rates rewards program," and the ending taps into the latter not the former
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