What Was The Last Movie You Watched?

[Worf]

I went to see Barbie yesterday, and enjoyed it immensely. Laughed out loud quite a few times. A surprisingly deft and knowing handling of the material, given its "official" status. Third in a good run I've had at the cinema (after Dial of Destiny and Asteroid City) since having time to go while on holiday, and not having been to the cinema at all since Joker in late 2019. Hoping to catch Oppenheimer tomorrow. Did look at going to the Imax, but it's sold out there until well into next week, and I want to see it before I go back to work on Monday.

Thanks man... As I said before it's nice to get "real world" reviews from friends. One question, Barbie, in theater or wait to stream?

Worf

 

[Edward]

Thanks man... As I said before it's nice to get "real world" reviews from friends. One question, Barbie, in theater or wait to stream?

Worf

Oh, now you're asking. I enjoyed it enough that I certainly think it's worth paying money to see. In technical terms, I don't think it's a film that seeing it on the big screen will be as difference an experience as seeing the Indy picture on the big vs small screen. It's not an action-picture, obviously. In an ideal world, I'd see everything on the cinema, I enjoy the sense of occasion, but it's certainly true that I've become a lot more selective with that in recent years as it's gotten so much more expensive to go to the cinema. (Fun fact: I spent more to see Asteroid City on the big screen than I did on the last ticket I bought to see Carmen at the Royal Opera House in Covent Garden!).

 

[GHT]

Fun fact: I spent more to see Asteroid City on the big screen than I did on the last ticket I bought to see Carmen at the Royal Opera House in Covent Garden!.

What you need is a relative in the know. My first cousin and I are very close, more like brother and sister. She has a son name of Matthew Buswell, a classical singer. http://avonsingers.com/musical-director/ Matthew is the bearded fellow, last but one on the far right.
Given that Matthew's mother is my first cousin, does that make him my second? Or are we unrelated?

 

[Edward]

What you need is a relative in the know. My first cousin and I are very close, more like brother and sister. She has a son name of Matthew Buswell, a classical singer. http://avonsingers.com/musical-director/ Matthew is the bearded fellow, last but one on the far right.
Given that Matthew's mother is my first cousin, does that make him my second? Or are we unrelated?

I think it's a second cousin thing--- tbh, though, I've never managed to get a handle on how that all works!

We've managed to get some amazing shows in at the Garden over the years as the wife is very adept at booking as soon as these things open. The other thing of course is that we're happy to sit up in the gods, as we now know the venue well enough to know exactly what seats we can book for single figures and still get a good view of the whole stage. We did once go up to the next level pricing of seats (a whole £25!) for a Christmas season performance of the Nutcracker, a head on view of the stage being a more important thing in the context of ballet, of course. I've almost always had to spend much more on West End musical tickets, yet it's poor old opera that gets labelled "elitist"!

 

[FOXTROT LAMONT]

Herman Melville's last dark passage brought to life, Billy Budd, Sailor tells tale of twisted law and logic wrapped
tightly with homoeroticism to tie a hangrope noose around an angel's neck. A thought provoking film that bares
naked human frailty, singular and collective, then lashes it with a lawful whip aboard a British naval frigate during
the late 18th Century Napoleonic era. Peter Ustinov, Terrence Stamp, and Robert Ryan.

Billy Budd, Sailor and the more recent Master and Commander with Russell Crowe, an unrecognized classic
deserve thoughtful viewing for timeless life lessons with larger than life themes.

 

[Fading Fast]

Intruder in the Dust from 1949, based on a William Faulkner novel, with Juano Hernandez, Claude Jarman Jr., David Brian, Elizabeth Patterson and Will Beer


Thirteen years before the anti-racism classic To Kill a Mockingbird, Hollywood produced Intruder in the Dust, an equally powerful anti-racism movie that, for some inexplicable reason, is all but forgotten today.

Early in the movie, we see an angry mob of southern white men crowding the outside of the jailhouse where a black man is being held on suspicion of murdering a white man. The crowd, seemingly, is just waiting for night to fall to lynch the black man.

The black man, portrayed by Juano Hernandez, once helped a white boy, played by Claude Jarman Jr., when he fell into a frozen pond on his property. Hernandez now asks Jarman to get his uncle, a prominent local lawyer, played by David Brian, to come to him.

Brian, a reasonably fair man, but still a man of his time and place, thinks like everyone else, that Hernandez is guilty. He all but ignores Hernandez's claim of innocence, especially when Hernandez himself is not forthcoming with details that could explain what happened.

With fuzzy guidance from Hernandez, Jarman and a quietly indominable older white woman, played by Elizabeth Patterson, follow up on Hernandez' hint of where a clue might be found. This, eventually, leads to Brian questioning his original assumptions.

The story itself, no spoilers coming as you want to see this one fresh, involves a white family in the lumber business, a brotherly feud, honest coincidences and enough prejudice to put a potentially innocent black man in danger from both the law and a mob.

Jarman, Brian, a surprisingly honest sheriff, played by Will Geer, and Patterson slowly work to unravel the story and find, if there is any, exonerating evidence. They work, though, against a clock ticking inside the mob.

None of this is made easier by Hernandez himself who, as we see in the present and through flashbacks, is a proud and, often, stubborn man rightfully unwilling to play, even for a moment, the part expected of a black man in the south in the 1940s.

In just less than ninety minutes, director Clarence Brown creates memorable characters, even most of the bad guys are complex, and powerful scenes that force viewers to think hard about race, prejudice, justice and what they would do in this situation.

One of those scenes has Patterson sitting at the front of the jail with a puddle of gasoline at her feet, poured there by the angry, heavy set white leader of the mob who is holding a match and threatening to burn Patterson if she doesn't get out of the way.

Patterson, nearly eighty, all skin and bones, sits calmly threading her needle for her sewing, but clearly showing fear, which is much better than having her be a cartoon hero. You want to have one moment in your life where you show as much courage and character.

Hernandez - an incredibly talented but forgotten actor as, being black, he couldn't be the leading man he would be today - delivers a memorable performance, in particular, because he isn't easily likable, but you respect him. Again, it's character and courage on display.

Brian is also impressive as the confident lawyer who grows a bit throughout the movie. He, too, isn't a cardboard hero, or maybe a hero at all, but a man who learned about himself and his prejudices by the end. His last scene with Hernandez is as good as movie making gets.

Jarman is fine in the role of the young white boy starting to see the raw and ugly prejudice that was around him all his life. He's there to remind us of youthful innocence before cynicism and prejudice takes hold.

Set in a poor rural community where everything, even the indoors, looks dusty, you can feel the poverty, the prejudice but also the pockets of goodness. Porter Hall, playing the one-armed dead man's father, gives a brilliantly nuanced performance on which everything hinges.

Intruder in the Dust's anti-racism message is equal to To Kill a Mockingbird's. So too are its memorable characters, situations and beautiful black and white cinematography. It's a powerful movie for its time that deserves more attention today.

 

[Trenchfriend]

Godfather I, the old DVD on my CRT!

 

[FOXTROT LAMONT]

I haven't read Faulkner's Intruder in the Dust nor seen this film. Mockingbird was quite good, book read in school
and tele, but somehow missed Intruder entirely. His Sound and Fury I recall from school reading but another possible film adaption missed.

 

[Fading Fast]

I haven't read Faulkner's Intruder in the Dust nor seen this film. Mockingbird was quite good, book read in school
and tele, but somehow missed Intruder entirely. His Sound and Fury I recall from school reading but another possible film adaption missed.

After reading a lot of Faulkner in high school and college I stopped, as I rarely need help finding reasons to feel depressed about the world, but I think I'm going to read "Intruder in the Dust" after seeing the movie.

 

[Trenchfriend]

Blade Runner - Final Cut

 

[FOXTROT LAMONT]

After reading a lot of Faulkner in high school and college I stopped, as I rarely need help finding reasons to feel depressed about the world, but I think I'm going to read "Intruder in the Dust" after seeing the movie.

Alan Arkin's recent passing gave recall back to uni parties and the Southern lit/film genre. Faulkner, Wolfe, and O'Connor, Carson McCullers, Harper Lee. Arkin created an indelible impression in McCullers' The Heart is A Lonely Hunter, both book and film hit hard. Faulkner Nobel laureate led the pack but the women were my favourites.

 

[Worf]

View attachment 538744
Intruder in the Dust from 1949, based on a William Faulkner novel, with Juano Hernandez, Claude Jarman Jr., David Brian, Elizabeth Patterson and Will Beer


Thirteen years before the anti-racism classic To Kill a Mockingbird, Hollywood produced Intruder in the Dust, an equally powerful anti-racism movie that, for some inexplicable reason, is all but forgotten today.

Early in the movie, we see an angry mob of southern white men crowding the outside of the jailhouse where a black man is being held on suspicion of murdering a white man. The crowd, seemingly, is just waiting for night to fall to lynch the black man.

The black man, portrayed by Juano Hernandez, once helped a white boy, played by Claude Jarman Jr., when he fell into a frozen pond on his property. Hernandez now asks Jarman to get his uncle, a prominent local lawyer, played by David Brian, to come to him.

Brian, a reasonably fair man, but still a man of his time and place, thinks like everyone else, that Hernandez is guilty. He all but ignores Hernandez's claim of innocence, especially when Hernandez himself is not forthcoming with details that could explain what happened.

With fuzzy guidance from Hernandez, Jarman and a quietly indominable older white woman, played by Elizabeth Patterson, follow up on Hernandez' hint of where a clue might be found. This, eventually, leads to Brian questioning his original assumptions.

The story itself, no spoilers coming as you want to see this one fresh, involves a white family in the lumber business, a brotherly feud, honest coincidences and enough prejudice to put a potentially innocent black man in danger from both the law and a mob.

Jarman, Brian, a surprisingly honest sheriff, played by Will Geer, and Patterson slowly work to unravel the story and find, if there is any, exonerating evidence. They work, though, against a clock ticking inside the mob.

None of this is made easier by Hernandez himself who, as we see in the present and through flashbacks, is a proud and, often, stubborn man rightfully unwilling to play, even for a moment, the part expected of a black man in the south in the 1940s.

In just less than ninety minutes, director Clarence Brown creates memorable characters, even most of the bad guys are complex, and powerful scenes that force viewers to think hard about race, prejudice, justice and what they would do in this situation.

One of those scenes has Patterson sitting at the front of the jail with a puddle of gasoline at her feet, poured there by the angry, heavy set white leader of the mob who is holding a match and threatening to burn Patterson if she doesn't get out of the way.

Patterson, nearly eighty, all skin and bones, sits calmly threading her needle for her sewing, but clearly showing fear, which is much better than having her be a cartoon hero. You want to have one moment in your life where you show as much courage and character.

Hernandez - an incredibly talented but forgotten actor as, being black, he couldn't be the leading man he would be today - delivers a memorable performance, in particular, because he isn't easily likable, but you respect him. Again, it's character and courage on display.

Brian is also impressive as the confident lawyer who grows a bit throughout the movie. He, too, isn't a cardboard hero, or maybe a hero at all, but a man who learned about himself and his prejudices by the end. His last scene with Hernandez is as good as movie making gets.

Jarman is fine in the role of the young white boy starting to see the raw and ugly prejudice that was around him all his life. He's there to remind us of youthful innocence before cynicism and prejudice takes hold.

Set in a poor rural community where everything, even the indoors, looks dusty, you can feel the poverty, the prejudice but also the pockets of goodness. Porter Hall, playing the one-armed dead man's father, gives a brilliantly nuanced performance on which everything hinges.

Intruder in the Dust's anti-racism message is equal to To Kill a Mockingbird's. So too are its memorable characters, situations and beautiful black and white cinematography. It's a powerful movie for its time that deserves more attention today.

View attachment 538751 View attachment 538753

Saw this film on TCM years ago. I too enjoyed it. It is a marvelous film. To your question, I believe the film was a decade too early AND the characters are so nuanced that you have to THINK while watching it. And I can tell you thinking about race in 1949 was NOT a thing audiences were inclined to do. Between WWII and the depression most of America wanted to just get on with their lives, not fully knowing that Korea, Viet Nam AND the civil rights movement was bearing down on them and fast. Not to mention the revolution that RnB and RnR were about to unleash on the youth of America. No... the film is masterful, but it asked too many questions in too many ways at the wrong time.

Worf

 

[Doctor Strange]

Intruder in the Dust is an excellent film... and I strongly recommend the book. And I say this having fought my way through most of Faulkner's books. (Absalom, Absalom has defeated me several times!)

It is just about the easiest of his books to read. There are no attempts to "tell the whole story of the world between one cap and period", no stream-of-consciousness sections told by an idiot, no page-long paragraphs, no complex family backstory, no major symbolism or Biblical allusions, etc. Just a cracking good story.

 

[Fading Fast]

Intruder in the Dust is an excellent film... and I strongly recommend the book. And I say this having fought my way through most of Faulkner's books. (Absalom, Absalom has defeated me several times!)

It is just about the easiest of his books to read. There are no attempts to "tell the whole story of the world between one cap and period", no stream-of-consciousness sections told by an idiot, no page-long paragraphs, no complex family backstory, no major symbolism or Biblical allusions, etc. Just a cracking good story.

I still feel cheated out of the time I spent reading the Benjy section.

 

[Fading Fast]

Voltaire from 1933 with George Arliss, Reginald Owen, Doris Kenyon, Alan Mowbray and Margaret Lindsay


You do not look to Golden Era historical films for accuracy, but entertainment. On that measure, Voltaire is a bit bumpy, but overall, comes close to fitting the bill.

Voltaire's tangential touch to history is that he, Voltaire, played here by George Arliss, was "at court" of King Louis XV in the early 1760s and he did argue for posthumous justice for his friend Calas and fair treatment of Calas' daughter, played by Margaret Lindsay.

In the movie version of the story, the King, played by Reginald Owen, is a fat, pompous but kind of pleasant buffoon, when he isn't throwing his power around. He likes Voltaire, but is angered by Voltaire's populous and implicitly anti-monarchy writings.

The King's mistress, played by Doris Kenyon, is a friend and advocate for Voltaire. Converesley, the King's fictional advisor, played by Alan Mowbray, who is looking to enrich himself and undermine the King and France, is an antagonist of Voltaire's.

Director John G. Adolfi frames the movie with Voltaire being an ardent promoter of freedom, liberty and justice for the people of France. Yes, Voltaire is against the vain and stupid King, but Voltaire's real enemy is Mowbray and Mowbray's control of the vapid King.

All this comes to a head over the King's unjust execution of a wealthy merchant, which leads to Voltaire trying to clear the dead merchant's name and protect the merchant's vulnerable daughter, Lindsay.

A good part of this somewhat offbeat movie is Voltaire in his house, often in his bedroom, writing. It's hard to make an old man, sitting at his desk writing, cinematically engaging and it isn't here. But Voltaire also has plenty of palace intrigue, which gives the movie a boost.

When there is no rule of law and just rule of one man, everyone courts favor with that one man, often with behind-the-scenes plotting. Foreshadowing movies like The Other Boleyn Girl, we see Voltaire scheming to expose Mowbray.

Mowbray, for his part, plots to have Voltaire arrested. Kenyon, though, plots to remain in the King's affection, get Mowbray removed and have her friend Voltaire remain in good standing with the King.

The machinations get a bit muddled, especially when Voltaire writes and stages a play for the King that alludes to the King's unfair treatment of the merchant. That leads to the climax (no spoilers coming) where Voltaire falls out of favor with the King, putting his and Lindsay's lives at risk.

With questionable historical accuracy and an awkwardly told story, what's left in Voltaire is the acting and, here, Arliss is entertaining if you can accept a bit of a showy performance that feels dated today.

Kenyon, though, delivers a smartly nuanced performance as the mistress who realizes the tenuousness of her position and the delicate balance she must strike trying to remain in the King's good graces, while also advocating for her friend Voltaire.

Mowbray is fine playing, once again, "the bad guy," and Owens is good if you enjoy your kings portrayed as bombastic clowns.

Bereft, pretty and diction-perfect Lindsay, unfortunately, doesn't get much to do in this one. Plus, she is, often, so wrapped in heavy clothes and scarves that even her beauty is obscured.

Voltaire is not the movie you use to introduce a young person to "classic cinema" as it's too dated and, simply, odd. For fans of old movies, though, Arliss' and Kenyon's performances are engaging, but even fans will find this mishmash of history only mildly entertaining.

 

[FOXTROT LAMONT]

Voltaire, like Rousseau was a bit distaff and stuffed to his gills with egotistic arrogance bereft moral clarity.
I quite despise both impudent goats but Voltaire more so for giants do not allow pygmies to climb atop their
shoulders, much less countenance brash arrogance. The Enlightenment offered a smorgasbord lacking much
and dared more than proven though I concur with Voltaire regarding Newton and his discovery of Calculus.
Newton, fellow alumnus of Trinity, achieved the Calculus but never happiness, quite the curmudgeon rather.

 

[Julian Shellhammer]

Saw this film on TCM years ago. I too enjoyed it. It is a marvelous film. To your question, I believe the film was a decade too early AND the characters are so nuanced that you have to THINK while watching it. And I can tell you thinking about race in 1949 was NOT a thing audiences were inclined to do. Between WWII and the depression most of America wanted to just get on with their lives, not fully knowing that Korea, Viet Nam AND the civil rights movement was bearing down on them and fast. Not to mention the revolution that RnB and RnR were about to unleash on the youth of America. No... the film is masterful, but it asked too many questions in too many ways at the wrong time.

Worf

"And I can tell you thinking about race in 1949 was NOT a thing audiences were inclined to do." You went right to the heart of it; well put, sir.

 

[Julian Shellhammer]

Scattering aphorisms right and left, Hawaii's own Detective Chan solves another murder mystery, in 1944's The Chinese Cat, helmed by Phil Rosen, who delivered several productions in the series. Chan is pressed into service by the daughter of a murdered man whose death remains unsolved by local PD, and he has only about 36 hours to crack the case. Monogram Pictures only gave Charlie 1 hour and 6 minutes of screen time, yet he pulls it off. WW2 is referenced only passingly, and at the end there is a request for "80,000,00 movie goers" to buy war stamps and bonds.
The series has not yet grown stale, and they continued for several more years, but from this side of history it is noticeable that the production has changed to a mid-B level.

 

[FOXTROT LAMONT]

The series has not yet grown stale, and they continued for several more years, but from this side of history it is noticeable that the production has changed to a mid-B level.

I've fascination with Second World War and post war American, British, and Japanese post war circa cinema.
In Britain limited budget focused more page than stage. America led the pack for large scale with nascent television
close behind, but Japanese natural human interior and emotional mastery film capture is without peer.

 

[MisterCairo]

Wr watched Asteroid City on PPV the other day.

I for the most part loathe Wes Anderson films. A couple I actually love (See Grand Budapest Hotel, .French Despatch)

This falls into my Life Aquatic zone of okay, glad I saw it, will never watch it again.

Great visuals, ScarJo, and a funny alien plot within a plot. Otherwise inexplicably broken play within a film plot device.

Your mileage may vary.