What Was The Last Movie You Watched?

[LizzieMaine]

I watched an old Roscoe Arbuckle short the other day and it came off as a little lame, contrary to what I've read about him. Shemp Howard happened to be in it, too, and there were some funny gags, but it was basically one long joke.

But on the other hand, it's hard not to watch something like that and remember that at one time, it was new and fresh. Everything was new once. That particular short had some wonderful accents, by the way.

That Arbuckle was one of his "comeback" shorts, made at the Vitaphone studio in Brooklyn in 1932 -- he hadn't made a screen appearance since 1921 as a result of The Scandal, and while he had kept his hand in as a director, he was rusty as a performer and a decade past his prime besides. Shemp was actually the bigger star at the time -- he had his own series at Vitaphone, and also appeared in supporting roles in various other comedies around the studio.

To see Arbuckle at his best, look for the silent shorts he did for his own studio in 1918-1919. His sidekicks in that series were Buster Keaton and Al St. John, and what they lack in plot, they more than make up in sheer comic energy. Arbuckle had a lot in common with Curly Howard as a big man with an immense and graceful collection of funny moves.

Whatever their defects, the Vitaphone talkie shorts landed Arbuckle a contract to make features for Warner Brothers, and it looked like he was headed back to the top of the pile -- but he died of a heart attack the night after signing the deal.

 

[Zombie_61]

' Risen' (2016).....A very low budget Maximus Meridius goes looking for the plump resurrected Christ. Biblical movies are dire at the best of times but this film is beyond bad...

I'm no Believer, but I recently watched this... in disbelief. It comes off like CSI: Judea!

Well, nuts. Now I have to watch this just to see how bad it is.

 

[Stearmen]

The Invisible Boy (1957) Terrible B movie, but it had as a costar, one of the most beloved caricatures in Sci-Fi movies, Robby The Robot!

 

[AmateisGal]

The Family with Robert DeNiro and Michelle Pfeiffer. Not your average mob movie, but billed as a dark comedy.

 

[LizzieMaine]

Just finished previewing "American Pastoral," Ewan McGregor's adaptation of Philip Roth's Pulitzer-winning novel of some years back.

Not everybody is a Roth fan, but I am -- and on that level I'm disappointed in the film. McGregor's adaptation gives the viewer a tense, intimate story of a shattered family for as far as that goes, but he completely misses the point of the novel, which is an aggressive critique of the cult of postwar respectability. By turning it into a straightforward story of a nice bourgie-liberal family with a troubled teenage daughter who drifts into a terrorist wing of the "New Left" in the late sixties, it manages to give the audience its $8.50's worth without giving them any particular answers.

Period detail was excellent, especially the scenes set in the family's glove factory in Newark, where you can fairly smell the machine oil and the leather hides. I was a bit amused, though, by the scene where McGregor as the dad is searching his daughter's room and comes across a stash of "radical literature." There among the copies of Ramparts, various Black Panther pamphlets, and other late-sixties New Left publications is a 1934 issue of the Daily Worker. Never mind that the Worker was called "The Daily World" in 1969, when the scene was set -- an adherent of the Weather Underground would have had nothing whatever to do with any publication of the CPUSA, which they viewed as an outmoded, outdated ideologically-compromised relic of the "Old Left," let alone bothering to read thirty-five-year old copies of such material. These filmmakers really need to hire a consultant for this kind of stuff.

 

[Fading Fast]

Just finished previewing "American Pastoral," Ewan McGregor's adaptation of Philip Roth's Pulitzer-winning novel of some years back.

Not everybody is a Roth fan, but I am -- and on that level I'm disappointed in the film. McGregor's adaptation gives the viewer a tense, intimate story of a shattered family for as far as that goes, but he completely misses the point of the novel, which is an aggressive critique of the cult of postwar respectability. By turning it into a straightforward story of a nice bourgie-liberal family with a troubled teenage daughter who drifts into a terrorist wing of the "New Left" in the late sixties, it manages to give the audience its $8.50's worth without giving them any particular answers.

Period detail was excellent, especially the scenes set in the family's glove factory in Newark, where you can fairly smell the machine oil and the leather hides. I was a bit amused, though, by the scene where McGregor as the dad is searching his daughter's room and comes across a stash of "radical literature." There among the copies of Ramparts, various Black Panther pamphlets, and other late-sixties New Left publications is a 1934 issue of the Daily Worker. Never mind that the Worker was called "The Daily World" in 1969, when the scene was set -- an adherent of the Weather Underground would have had nothing whatever to do with any publication of the CPUSA, which they viewed as an outmoded, outdated ideologically-compromised relic of the "Old Left," let alone bothering to read thirty-five-year old copies of such material. These filmmakers really need to hire a consultant for this kind of stuff.

God bless you. While I agree in practice and even stronger in theory that they should get these details correct, my guess is you and the other three people on earth truly qualified to be the right consultant for that movie are also the only ones who would notice or, a least, be bothered by the error.

I vaguely remember reading that book when it came out ('90s sometime, I think) and thinking it was a very strong novel, but not as strong as the fawning reviews - it was no major piece of American literature, but a good book for that year.

My - and remember, this is a vague old impression - memory is that it was impressive in its ability to make you see, feel and empathize with an upper-middle-class family being torn apart as the daughter joined the radical left. But what it missed was a larger meaning - a right, a wrong, an underlying ethos that offered, at least, an opinion of a better way. That left me unsatisfied. I might not agree with the author's moral view or opinions of right or wrong, but he / she should have one.

 

[LizzieMaine]

What bugged me even more than the technical details was that the movie misrepresented the Lvovs' marriage -- while they suggested that Dawn was having an affair with the "respectable" neighbor in the tight orange polo shirt, the novel was far more explicit about this, leading Swede to question his own assumptions about the world he lived in. And there's no mention at all of Swede himself having had an affair with his daughter's therapist. In the movie, there's no discovery, no personal upheaval, no divorce, and no assumptions challenged. Swede doesn't acknowledge that much of what his daughter has pointed out about his own life and his own perception of that life was basically correct -- he simply grieves the loss of his child and wonders "how she got that way." The story of his search for the daughter is compelling, but compared to the book it feels gutted.

I'm not a fan of Jennifer Connelly, but she's a pretty good choice for the empty, soulless mother. All her characters feel empty and soulless to me, so she's cast to type. Dakota Fanning, on the other hand, will be nominated for an Oscar.

 

[Fading Fast]

Bette Davis and Franchot Tone in "Dangerous," a pre-code-in-spirit movie hemmed in by 1935's enforcement of the code.

Tone, an up-and-coming society architect, is engaged to a socially prominent women (played with nuance and feeling by Margaret Lindsey), but he, basically, throws it all away when he pulls a down-and-out (drunk and dishabille), prematurely washed-up theater star - Davis - out of the bar and into his home.

I saw this movie for the first time last year and liked it, but liked it even more this time. Those '30s movie know how to pack a lot of story into and hour and twenty minutes. Davis is both young and sparkling and hard and bitter as the part calls for and she pulls it all off with star power and conviction. She is an actress with her performance here being another example of method acting well before the young stars of the fifties fell in love with themselves for "discovering" something that was around long before them, just without a marketing name.

And Davis makes this her movie - she breaks open Tone's engagement, forms it into a triangle and then we watch him writhe around as he tries to avoid Davis and stay true to Lindsey, but can't.

This is perfect pre-code, real-life stuff (passion and pragmatism don't always align in love) that works here, but would work better if the code didn't keep forcing silliness in. In real life (pre-code world), Tone's sleeping with both of them (all these separate bedrooms are silly), in real life (pre-code world), Tone's fiancee is a whole lot less understanding and in real life (pre-code world), the ending is completely different (less code nice, more life messy - I'll leave it at that if you haven't seen it).

I am looking forward to seeing this one again as I think it's one of those that gets better as you notice more stuff with each viewing.

 

[MisterCairo]

Fury. Interestingly, it was my wife's choice!

 

[Scooterz]

Speaking of Mister Cairo I watched The Maltese Falcon yesterday.

 

[Doctor Strange]

Bridge of Spies. A good film, but it didn't live up to the hype for me. Very well done, but it didn't engage my emotions. Not the top-level Spielberg I expected.

 

[MisterCairo]

Speaking of Mister Cairo I watched The Maltese Falcon yesterday.

"You... you bungled it. You and your stupid attempt to buy it. Kemedov found out how valuable it was, no wonder we had such an easy time stealing it. You... you imbecile. You bloated idiot. You stupid fat-head you!"

 

[Fading Fast]

"You... you bungled it. You and your stupid attempt to buy it. Kemedov found out how valuable it was, no wonder we had such an easy time stealing it. You... you imbecile. You bloated idiot. You stupid fat-head you!"

The piling on of one insult after another is awesome.

Also, Greenstreet takes it all in with surprising equanimity.

The movie deserves all its accolade.

 

[AmateisGal]

Bridget Jones Diary and Bridget Jones' Baby. The original is still the best, but the latest installment brings it all to a very satisfying conclusion for the romantic in me.

Up next! Mr. Blandings Builds His Dream House on TCM, followed by All About Eve. Since we're in the midst of an ice storm and thus housebound, it's the perfect afternoon to watch classic movies.

 

[Lean'n'mean]

' Swiss Army Man' (2016)......undescribable but original & inventive. Good to see Harry Potter in a decent flick too, he really does play a good corpse.

 

[Touchofevil]

Hanna

 

[Stearmen]

Flight Angels (1940) Not very good!

 

[Fading Fast]

"Hail, Caesar!"

The parts are better than the whole, but the really good parts make it all worthwhile.
- The scene where Ralph Feinnes instructs Alden Ehrenreich on how to say dialogue could stand alone as a classic comedy sketch
- George Clooney's clueless character's pseudo-intellectualism-inspired protest to the studio boss and then collapse was pitch perfect
- The, kinda, cameos - maybe small roles, I don't know where does one end and other begin - for both Scarlett Johansson and Tilda Swenson were spot-on "Old Hollywood" send-ups
----- With Johansson's scene with Jonah Hill as the fixer arranging her baby's "adoption" being speed-dialogue at its best
- Every time Mannix's secretary popped up as super-straight guy to Mannix's straight guy, the dry humor quotient went up several notches.

Throughout, Josh Brolin, as on-site studio boss, keeps it all moving forward in a frantic-'50s-parody style that - like the entire movie - plays it all a bit over-the-top, but never becomes too goofy or silly. What kept it from being a great movie is an audience engagement with the over-arching story about the disappearance / kidnapping of the the star (Clooney) from the studio's marquee picture. You only half care about this story as the director never takes it seriously, so you don't. But you do care about each scene - like the ones noted above and a few '40-'50s inspired dance, music or dramatic movie scenes or the one where the religious leaders opine on the appropriateness of Christ / God's representation in the movie being produced (this latter one could have been written by Woody Allen).

With some incredible Fedora Lounge eye-candy in every scene (Brolin wears two beautiful vintage watches), the movie is a fun romp that holds your attention, but never fully engages you in the story; instead, you enjoy all the fun things going on (in great style) even if the reason they're all in the same movie isn't that important.

 

[Doctor Strange]

Agreed. Hail, Caesar! isn't a class-A Coen Bros. film. But even a class-B Coen Bros. film is a rare delight. The parts that work are brilliant, the parts that don't are easy to ignore, and it's simply gorgeous to look at.

I was pretty disappointed when I saw it in theaters last winter, but I recently gave it a second watch on cable and liked it more. Not a brilliantly cohesive masterpiece like their best films, but it's got plenty of that unique Coen goodness.

 

[Touchofevil]

Agreed. Hail, Caesar! isn't a class-A Coen Bros. film. But even a class-B Coen Bros. film is a rare delight. The parts that work are brilliant, the parts that don't are easy to ignore, and it's simply gorgeous to look at.

I was pretty disappointed when I saw it in theaters last winter, but I recently gave it a second watch on cable and liked it more. Not a brilliantly cohesive masterpiece like their best films, but it's got plenty of that unique Coen goodness.

We felt the same way having first seen it in the theater. We liked it enough but were ultimately somewhat disappointed. Having seen it recently a couple of times on HBO, we have enjoyed it moreso. Lowered expectations? Most likely, but it is still better than much of what is out there.