Review Recently Seen, Part 1 (Feb 2017)

[plsletitrain]

Iknowrite? I was like, um, oops, yeah that's me.

Bang-on.

My favorite line was when the husband was complaining to his coworkers, "I can't even eat. I have to eat on the toilet, or even when we're doing it!" and the one guy says to the other "Have you ever tried that?" and he deadpans "We had yogurt once." I was dying. That line is just so damn Korean, and I can't explain why. Even their sex jokes are wholesome.

Haha yeah!!! I laughed so hard at that part too. That scene where he was taking a dump and the wife stuffs the drink on his mouth, oh the agony on his look. And that scene where out of anger he thought of stuffing all the food in the mouth of his wife to silence her but its all confined to his thoughts because he can't do it for real. I'll bet my ass my husband has thought of that exact same thing too.

 

[Zelena]

You're in New York. Ask some of your actor friends what they think of gimmick acting. It's something I heard about from a theater director years and years ago. He said it was something bad actors do, as a crutch.

Something like ... it's an unconscious act that looks stupid when done consciously. Like having sex. I can't escape it. It's true, with apology exceptions to Brad Pitt.

Huh, well good point. When you said Brad Pitt I thought you were going to mention a good gimmick: the rubber glove in Fight Club

You're absolutely right about how hard it is to do things that people normally do unconsciously. I wish there were 12 more hours of Michael Caine videos instructing us how to do it right. But I do remember him instructing the students on how to smoke a cigarette -- I'll have to go back and watch that again. If you weren't impressed with the actors really getting drunk for real in Right Now, Wrong Then... hell... well what are people supposed to do, avoid those human actions?

I guess the masters like Tony Leung don't use gimmicks. (This forum doesn't allow bookmark to 2:33 mark)

But dammit, he smokes and he drinks and he eats in those films.

I'm intrigued now. What do you think are legitimate uses in film of ingesting things and props etc? Or you just think it's done badly by hack actors?

I'm not an actor, but I have worked as an extra a few times for fun. One time recently I was in a period piece with all hippies at a commune. It was mostly 20-somethings playing flower children, and they looked great and convincing in costume. But I'm a 40-something bald guy with a beard. They put me in bell-bottoms and plaid shirts and whatnot, but it wasn't working. Then the costume girl had a brainwave, and she said "would you be willing to try this?" and she handed me this indian-style linen frock sort of thing, open chest to the waist, that a guru would wear. Voila! Suddenly I was a character that belonged in that scene, and it was brilliant. This is a digression, but I'm just saying, gimmicks can sometimes make that suspension of disbelief come alive and work, for the actor, and then for the audience. That day I truly learned the meaning of genius in costume design.

A propos of nothing, I did re-watch 2046 again, and I will write it up, and I think I will have to watch In the Mood for Love again too. I'm in the mood for WkW these days.

 

[Zelena]

Haha yeah!!! I laughed so hard at that part too. That scene where he was taking a dump and the wife stuffs the drink on his mouth, oh the agony on his look. And that scene where out of anger he thought of stuffing all the food in the mouth of his wife to silence her but its all confined to his thoughts because he can't do it for real. I'll bet my ass my husband has thought of that exact same thing too.

Between this and Comrades, you're having quite a good week!

 

[plsletitrain]

Between this and Comrades, you're having quite a good week!

Yes, definitely! And my Moonlight drama binge watching has been put on hold yet again. Ugh. Hehe. Disclaimer: I like your post because I love how you write and express your thoughts. But I have a dislike on that post: the last part. (Specifically 2046 and In The Mood for Love--WKW and me are incompatible) so yeah, I can't really understand how people get to rewatch these. ;) I think by the time you guys are so engrossed with your discussions on those two films (which surely I will never have any two cents to drop upon except probably an emoticon that pulls her own hair), I'll finish on those dramas I've left.

 

[sitenoise]

What do you think are legitimate uses in film of ingesting things and props etc? Or you just think it's done badly by hack actors?

Specifically with regards to eating food, it is just mostly badly done by bad actors, or a (usually bad) actor will be instructed by an unimaginative (or comedy) director to do it. They either err in thinking it will make the scene look like it's natural everyday stuff, or they want the character to be branded as the dumb obnoxious one. The former can be pulled off, but it's difficult. The latter is acceptable to those who like movies like The Hangover, and consider them "comedy"--it's fair to think that.

I've seen Brad eat acceptably. The woman in Cafe Lumiere comes to mind. Her performance is so naturalistically non-acting it's unconscious. I enjoyed watching her eat a bowl of mutton.

But then when you move beyond eating food, it's wildly subjective. Imagine, for example, the Comrades scene near the beginning where Maggie is mopping the floor (like nobody mops a floor) while Opie is sitting at the table. Imagine if Maggie had just thrown something in the trash instead, and then they had that conversation with her just standing there doing nothing but talking to him. "That's not what the director wanted." "That would have slowed down the film". I get that, but don't know for sure if it was the right choice or would have 'slowed' the film down. But I'm comfortable calling it bad mopping-acting. Same with the window cleaning scene that came shortly after that. When she scrubbed the same spot for the third time my skin was crawling. Oh wait, she was nervous with sexual tension or something, and a person that nervous would scrub the same spot three times. Maybe, but I don't think that was it.

This is one of those things for me that had an impact early on and I can't unsee it. I overplay it a bit for fun, though.

​

 

[sitenoise]

Right Now, Wrong Then... hell... well what are people supposed to do, avoid those human actions?

I don't know if I was impressed, but that aspect of the film wasn't the deal-breaker. I wrote in my review of Hellcats, that Min-hie Kim's "performance is shockingly genuine, pulling off the nearly impossible: acting drunk and shrill without losing any of her charm". She acted it in that film.

It can be done. I also praised Emily Blunt for her drunk portrayal in The Girl on the Train, and but she had help from the director. He knew how to bend the photography to mimic it or something.

 

[Zelena]

They either err in thinking it will make the scene look like it's natural everyday stuff, or they want the character to be branded as the dumb obnoxious one.

Okay I see what you're saying now. If you had said "intentionally comedic over-munching" I probably would have said, oh yeah, ok. But the thing with eating is that a lot of times getting together for a meal or a beer or a coffee is the pretext for a social interaction (in film life as in real life) so there are a lot of scenes like that. Your review of Tony Leung's soup imbibition? Or perhaps you would rather not say?

bad mopping-acting

I lol'ed. Good God man, you're a tough customer! Yes, DiNiro actually took a job for six months as a cab driver in New York to study for Taxi Driver, and okay, Maggie Cheung probably should have gone full method but didn't. But to criticize somebody's mopping technique so pointedly, my dear comrade, borders on the churlish. I still can't sort out my emojis, so take that one in good fun.

 

[sitenoise]

But to criticize somebody's mopping technique so pointedly

I blame the director for that. Maggie did the best she could. I don't think the scene was conceived with her just standing there, and Maggie suggested maybe she should be mopping instead. Most of my objection to that film is director based. Like the chase scene @plsletitrain pointed out at the end. Ugh. I agree with comrade @divemaster13 that the double coat button up was a brilliant idea. But whoa on the execution. I don't know why I take it as a personal affront when a film doesn't work for me. But at the opposite end, I'm pretty gaga when a film pleases me.

That's a wonderful video on In the Mood for Love. Makes me want to watch it again. The bit about frames within the frame ... that's what Madame Bovary did so, so well. And but isn't it the perennial question of whether that's Wong's or Christopher's work? We see it in other Doylies.

And that guy almost quoted me from one of my Sono reviews when he talked about the film being both improvised, on-the-fly-y, and yet, in the hands of complete control. That's why I think Sono is genius. He does that all the time. He can do it all the time because he has vision. Not that you have to like it, but he's got it.

 

[sitenoise]

Doesn't the fact that I use the term eating-acting (and its brethren) as if it's already in every Encyclopedia of Film and Acting Technique make it less churlish?

 

[Zelena]

That's a wonderful video on In the Mood for Love. Makes me want to watch it again. The bit about frames within the frame ... that's what Madame Bovary did so, so well. And but isn't it the perennial question of whether that's Wong's or Christopher's work? We see it in other Doylies.

Yeah there is good stuff in all of the Doylies, it reminds me of Coppola, and how he really hires the best people and gives them a lot of credit and latitude; if you listen to the director commentary track of Apocalypse Now, he's basically name-checking and complimenting every person in the cast and crew. He gets these good people and drives them hard. Maybe WkW similar. CD definitely co-directs everything he works on, to some extent. You can have total control, or Chris Doyle, pick one.

And that guy almost quoted me from one of my Sono reviews when he talked about the film being both improvised, on-the-fly-y, and yet, in the hands of complete control. That's why I think Sono is genius. He does that all the time. He can do it all the time because he has vision. Not that you have to like it, but he's got it.

If wish I could like more Sono films, it's the violence thing, but I recognize his towering genius just from his one good film. Again, similar to Coppola, letting a lot of improvisation happen. Making a film is definitely an emergent process, when it's done fully. Just shooting a script is one art [the Hitchcock thing], but running a process where things happen in front of the camera is another, and I think that represents some of the greatest of the great films.

 

[Daniel Larusso]

2001: A Space Odyssey (1968) - 3rd viewing
More than a story, this film actually made me feel like I went into space. The visual effects are mind-blowing, this film is a visual beauty even 50 years later. It also gave me a perfect feel of isolation, I was so terrified by HAL's actions. It's a film about man's evolution, so it inspired me to make this video about the creation of a solar oven when I was in highschool . I was applauded by the whole class, teacher included, and I still remember that moment as one of the most important achievements of my life.
9/10

 

[sitenoise]

hmm .. that video won't play for me. says "can't be played with your current setup"

 

[Daniel Larusso]

hmm .. that video won't play for me. says "can't be played with your current setup"

My vimeo channel is here https://vimeo.com/user2359555.
Click on "Forno Solar".

 

[plsletitrain]

@Daniel Larusso

If ever the term "movie that's ahead of its time" comes up, I instantly think of 2001. Funny during that scene where I think it was the human (sorry I've watched this a long time ago I've forgotten some details) who was travelling...it was for how many minutes that it was only his face being shown and just some colors (probably talking about space travel), I paused the video and went to the IMDb message boards to check if the video I was watching wasn't broken. I saw on some posts that that part was a bit too long, so yeah, I was able to confirm the video isn't broken. It really WAS long.

 

[sitenoise]

My vimeo channel is here https://vimeo.com/user2359555.
Click on "Forno Solar".

Same Error over there.

 

[sitenoise]

My Volleyball Forum is down and it's playoff weekend

 

[Daniel Larusso]

Moana (2016)
It was okay. The animation is gorgeous (especially the water) and it had 2 nice songs, "You're Welcome" (sung by Dwayne Johnson) and "How Far I'll Go ", which got an oscar nomination for best song. There isn't much else in this film, the story is so simple but it's what I expected from a family film by Disney.
6/10

The New World (2005) - Extended Cut
Wow... I was blown away. It's one of the most beautiful films I've ever seen. I didn't think of anything else during this journey to another land and time, to a new world. Loved the cinematography, the nature sounds, the images/music over narration, the emotions... I cried a bit in one of the romantic scenes with Colin Farrell and Pocahontas. I fell in love with her expressions, body language and her innocense. Christian Bale and Colin Farrell have powerful performances as well. This is such an emotionally rich film, I felt like I was opening my heart.
9/10

Same Error over there.

Hmm.. weird.. maybe it's your browser?

@Daniel Larusso

If ever the term "movie that's ahead of its time" comes up, I instantly think of 2001. Funny during that scene where I think it was the human (sorry I've watched this a long time ago I've forgotten some details) who was travelling...it was for how many minutes that it was only his face being shown and just some colors (probably talking about space travel), I paused the video and went to the IMDb message boards to check if the video I was watching wasn't broken. I saw on some posts that that part was a bit too long, so yeah, I was able to confirm the video isn't broken. It really WAS long.

I loved every second of it. Very trippy stuff

 

[divemaster13]

Samurai I: Musashi Miyamoto (1954): The first installment of Hiroshi Inagaki's trilogy of the real-life Japanese ronin samurai / folk hero Mushashi Miyamoto (played by Toshiro Mifune in all three movies). I actually saw the third part (Duel at Ganryu Island) several years ago, not realizing it was the last part of a trilogy.

Anyway, this first film focuses on Miyamoto as a young man. Basically, he's the village hothead, prone to impulsive behavior. He and a buddy seek fame in battle, but all the hothead gets for his trouble is to be hunted down by his own village. Through the mechanisms of a monk, he finally gets tamed. To add to his troubles, his buddy's fiancee turns her attention to him, which adds confusion for sure.

3.5 / 5

I'll be watching the second installment soon (thanks, Netflix!) and then might re-watch the third one so it sits better in context.

 

[Daniel Larusso]

Loved The New World so much, I tried to be Malick in my backyard

 

[Zelena]

The New World (2005) - Extended Cut
Wow... I was blown away. It's one of the most beautiful films I've ever seen. I didn't think of anything else during this journey to another land and time, to a new world. Loved the cinematography, the nature sounds, the images/music over narration, the emotions... I cried a bit in one of the romantic scenes with Colin Farrell and Pocahontas. I fell in love with her expressions, body language and her innocense. Christian Bale and Colin Farrell have powerful performances as well. This is such an emotionally rich film, I felt like I was opening my heart.
9/10

Great flick. I really appreciated how he filmed it in exactly the place where the real events happened, on the James river in Virgina. I have spent a lot of time in that area and the flora/fauna/landscape/climate is absolutely unique, so it's cool to see the real place as the backdrop. This is one of my favorite historical films. I don't know if you've seen The Thin Red Line but it's visually very similar, but a bit tedious as a story.