411. Khaneh siah ast/The House is Black (1963)

Running Time: 22 minutes
Directed By: Forugh Farrokhzad
Written By: Forugh Farrokhzad
Main Cast: (narration): Ebrahim Golestan, Forugh Farrokhzad

IRANIAN NEW WAVE

This won't take long, trust me. "The House is Black" is a twenty-two minute short, documentary that covers the everyday life of a leper colony. I must say that as I delve deeper and deeper into the pages of the "1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die" book, I'm finding out a lot about my own tastes. For example, the other day I discovered a disdain for experimental films. Today, I'm starting to think there aren't any good short subjects out there either.

To summarize the plot here would be kind of pointless. Like I said, it takes us inside the gate of a leper colony and shows us some of the unfortunate individuals who are forced to deal with this terrible disease. We see kids who suffer with the illness, playing and gathering at school and adults who go to clinics and try to get help for this curable ailment. The title comes directly from the film, when a boy is asked to write a sentence using the word "house", he comes up with "the house is black" - showing just how bleak these poor souls are. For the most part, the film plays like a poem and I wasn't surprised when I read the entry in THE BOOK and found out that Forugh Farrokhzad was indeed a poet. The narration (mostly from her) is more of a prayer than a narration and only briefly does the poetic language break to actually give us a little bit of info about the lepers themselves. Apparently, Farrokhzad's motive in making "The House is Black" was to erase some of the ugliness in the world and show that even these deformed human beings have personalities of their own and have a future of their own and to shed a little light on a disease that is mostly hidden in darkness.

You know, I'd love to be able to come here and sing this film's praises and say things like, "This film was just a breath of fresh air and it really made me feel for these poor people and the oppression that they have to endure." I'm not saying that those are untrue statements, I'm simply saying that it just didn't hit me as hard as it apparently hit others. I saw a twenty-two minute film that didn't educate or sympathize with lepers, but rather pitied the poor people that had the disease. If I had leprosy and I saw this movie, I think I might be a little offended. I mean, I'm in agreement that these people deserve a little bit of pity and sorrow, but to ramble on for even twenty-two minutes and spout off poetry and prayer, it just makes it that much more bleak.

I don't know, maybe I just didn't take the film the way I was supposed to and I know it didn't impact me as much as it did others (most notably the contributors to THE BOOK). I feel for anyone who has any type of debilitating disease, but "The House is Black" didn't make me anymore sympathetic than I already would have been. If they really wanted to make a film and educate people about the disease and take us inside a leper colony and dropped all the poetic crap, that would have been one thing, but this was something else. Actually had they approached it like Peter Watkins approached "The War Game", it could have been a really special little gem - as it is, it isn't.

RATING: 4/10 I appreciated the education and such, but ultimately this just wasn't up my alley. If it had been a little more powerful and a little more eye opening, I may have gone with the "unrateable" rating, but "The House is Black" is certainly rateable.

MOVIES WATCHED: 368
MOVIES LEFT TO WATCH: 633

December 14, 2011 10:18pm

476. Ostre sledovane vlaky/Closely Watched Trains (1967)

Running Time: 92 minutes
Directed By: Jiri Menzel
Written By: Jiri Menzel, from novel by Bohumil Hrabal
Main Cast: Vaclav Neckar, Vlastimil Brodsky, Jitka Bendova, Josef Somr, Vladimir Valenta
Click here to view the trailer

CZECH NEW WAVE

This will actually be the first of, at least two (maybe three), posts today. I received this and "The House is Black" (with a running time of 22 minutes) in the mail today from Netflix and plan to get them both out of the way in one, quick swoop. As for "Closely Watched Trains" - I watched it closely, but wasn't that impressed.

Milos Hrma (Neckar) is a young boy, on the cusp of manhood who's life goal is to get through life without having to do too much manual labor. When the film starts we hear about Milos' family history and how all the men of his family have, pretty much, been loafers. Milos has just landed a job as a train dispatcher, where his duties will be to stand on a train platform and basically do nothing. Milos is a virgin, however he wants to change this and his eyes are on Masa (Bendova), a young, female train conductor. His co-worker Hubicka (Somr) tries to give him a little coaching in the ways of wooing a woman, as Hubicka seems to be in a constant state of arousal, grabbing onto any women who gives him a second look. When Milos finally gets Masa alone, with intentions of making love to her, he does what many virgins do and finishes in a premature state (if you know what I mean). This makes Milos feel like less of a man and he'd rather not be a man than feel like half of one, so he proceeds to commit suicide, but is saved at the last minute by a passerby. When Milos consults with a doctor, he is informed that premature ejaculation is quite normal and that he should find an older, more experienced woman to "teach" him. Meanwhile, all of this is happening in the midst of the Nazi occupation and wouldn't you know it, young Milos gets dragged into that mess as well.

I must admit, I had really high hopes for this one. I'm not sure why I held such high hopes - maybe because my previous encounter with Czech cinema ("The Shop on Main Street") was such a fantastic one. In the end, however, I just had a really hard time getting a grasp on this one and ultimately I'm left not quite knowing what to make of it. Is it a comedy? Is it a tragedy? or is it an odd mixture of both? Actually it's the latter and the mixture of comedy and tragedy here just didn't work for me as well as it could have. I loved nearly everything about "Closely Watched Trains", except that when it came to the actual story there wasn't much substance there. I loved the setting, because for some reason the idea of a movie set at a train station during the Nazi occupation just really appeals to me. I loved the photography - the snow falling against the tree covered hills of Czechoslovakia was, indeed, a sight for sore eyes. I even really liked the characters to an extent. The characters, especially Milos, didn't even resemble the type of character you'd find in a Czech New Wave film. He more resembled the type of character you'd find in modern, American cinema, possibly in the confines of a Wes Anderson film.

However, even though I liked the basic foundation for the characters, I just really had a hard time getting a grasp on them and ultimately they were merely a contributing factor for my mediocre feeling on this film. Also, the plot is just very dry and in the end, I found myself trying to sum up the events of the film and found myself not coming up with very much. The actions of the characters are portrayed in such a subtle manner that nothing really ever feels like it happened. Even when Milos attempts suicide, it just doesn't have the feeling that a film should have when it's main character is about to off himself. It's just as if we go from this to that to suicide to this to that and there's really no feeling that important events are happening. The bottom line is that "Closely Watched Trains" definitely gets points for building a good atmosphere and building it in a intriguing setting. However, the plot falls very short and the characters, while the intentions were good, just don't really hold up in the end.

RATING: 5.5/10 I was gonna' go '6', but that's just a smidgen too high, in my opinion. I'll keep this one in the forefront of my mind and we'll revisit it at RECAP time.

MOVIES WATCHED: 367
MOVIES LEFT TO WATCH: 634

December 14, 2011 4:02pm

Double Nichols - COMING SOON

December 14, 2011 12:25am

437. The Sound of Music (1965)

Running Time: 174 minutes
Directed By: Robert Wise
Written By: Ernest Lehman, Richard Rodgers, Oscar Hammerstein (from stage musical) and from books by Howard Lindsay and Russel Crouse
Main Cast: Julie Andrews, Christopher Plummer, Richard Haydn, Eleanor Parker, Charmian Carr
Click here to view the trailer

WISE WEEK: THE CONCLUSION

I want to dedicate this review to my dear commenter, Ray. He has apparently been waiting, filled with dread, since June for me to post this review and now that it's posted, he'll be able to visit my blog without the fear that "The Sound of Music" is going to pop out at him. Here you go Ray - I hope seeing the poster for this film didn't ruin your day.

The film's primary character is Maria (Andrews), a wannabe nun, who can't seem to help herself but to belt out songs everywhere she goes. In fact, she's become such a problem around the monastery , that the nun's are forced to ask themselves, "How do you solve a problem like Maria?". Well the solution to the nun's problem is to send Maria to become the Governess to the very wealthy von Trapp family, headed up by Captain Georg von Trapp (Plummer). Georg has seven children, whom he had with his late wife and a Governess (or nanny, i guess would be the modern term) is needed to help keep the children in order. Georg demands discipline from his seven children (ranging in age from five to sixteen) and now from his Governess, but Maria isn't the type to distribute discipline. Instead, she makes friends with the children and teaches them to play, sing songs and basically BE children. Georg is hesitant about the recent, fun and fancy free behavior of his kids, but soon adapts to their new attitudes and even lightens up a bit himself. The clan get along pretty well together, until Maria feels herself falling in love with the Captain. When this occurs, she leaves a note and heads back to the monastery. But Georg won't let her go that easily, as he's developed a soft spot for her as well.

I, unlike Ray, wasn't completely repulsed by this picture. However, at the same time, I wasn't completely taken with it, like so many others apparently have been. For my tastes, the film was just WAY too wholesome. This was like an animated Disney movie, except it had real, human actors instead of cartoons. Julie Andrews was about enough to make you vomit, as she pranced around through the hills, singing her songs and being entirely too "goody-two-shoes". However, at the same time you also had Christopher Plummer in there and he was marvelous in this. Believe it or not, this was the first time I had ever seen "The Sound of Music" and I had absolutely no idea that Plummer was a part of the cast. You know what else I had no idea of? I had no idea that this was based on a real family. That little factoid kind of blew me away, when I read about it just moments before starting this review. The fact that you have a movie, based on a real family who were so close to the rise of the Nazi-regime and then to color it with such a rose-colored crayon is kind of odd.

As for the rest of my opinions, they're really kind of mixed. If "The Sound of Music" were a volume control, then the movie was turned up to it's maximum capacity during the musical numbers and turned nearly as low as it would go during every other part. The whole film just felt like a series of bridges to get from one musical number to the next and on top of that, there was really no point in all the singing. The musical numbers felt like they were just there for the sake of being there and there was really no flow between the plot and the singing. Sure, some of the songs are quite catchy ("Do-Re-Mi" and "Edelweiss" being my two favorite performances), but it just all felt very pointless. The plot was held together with shoe strings and super glue and really, if you were to cut out all the musical numbers, this film wouldn't really amount to much, kind of like "West Side Story". Also, let's talk about the length! Was three hours really necessary?? An easy was to chop off about thirty minutes or so, would have been to have the credits roll when Maria walked down the aisle to marry Georg. Of course, you don't get to the whole Georg bailing on the Third Reich stuff, but it was easily dismissible . However, in doing that you'd be chopping off one of my favorite parts of the film - When Georg tries to sing "Edelweiss" at the festival and gets choked up, only to be helped along by the rest of his family.

I'd say with a shorter length, a little less singing and a little more development in the plot department, you'd have a home run with "The Sound of Music", but as it is, it has it's fair share of problems and I have a bit of a hard time believing that it was the best picture of 1965. Plummer was great, some of the musical numbers were very well-done and catchy (how about the "Sixteen Going On Seventeen" number, in the middle of a thunderstorm and very well choreographed) and the picture really looked magnificent, aesthetically. However, I think the bad things I mentioned outweigh those few good things and we're left with a mediocre picture, at best.

RATING: 6/10 Anything higher than that would be me just being generous. As for Robert Wise, I can't say I'm too upset to see his dedication week come to an end.

MOVIES WATCHED: 366
MOVIES LEFT TO WATCH: 635

COMING SOON:
The Saragossa Manuscript (1965 - Wojciech Has)
Closely Watched Trains (1966 - Jiri Menzel)
The House is Black (1962 - Forough Farrokhzad)

December 14, 2011 12:03am

384. Dog Star Man (1962)

Running Time: 74 minutes
Directed By: Stan Brakhage
Written By: Stan Brakhage
Main Cast: Stan Brakhage, Jane Brakhage

I'M BEGINNING TO HATE EXPERIMENTAL FILMS!

Note: The "1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die" book notes that the running time of "Dog Star Man" is thirty minutes. However, it also says and I quote, "...as five discrete sections weave an escalating number of superimposed images...". If you take that to mean that all five sections are to be included as part of the entry of "Dog Star Man", then the film is in fact approximately 70 minutes. Furthermore, icheckmovies.com only lists "Part 1" as part of the "1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die" book/list and the year 1962 also leads me to believe that only "Part 1" was to be included in the entry, seeing as how all five sections span from 1962 - 1964. In not wanting to skip anything that I should've watched for the book, I watched all five parts.

This was actually on my "unfound list" for quite sometime, before I discovered as part of a Stan Brakhage Anthology put out by Criterion and available on Netflix. It's an experimental film and as I make my way deeper and deeper into THE BOOK, I'm really starting to uncover my dislike for such movies.

I'm not even going to bother with trying to relay the plot here, because as far as I'm concerned there wasn't a plot. I'm sure there actually WAS a plot, it's just that I think the film was more of a visual feast and besides I didn't get much in the semblance of a plot anyway. The film is a plethora of images being fired at the screen and is almost headache inducing. The only thing that I was really able to piece together, was a man and his dog climbing a snowy mountainside and fighting for their survival. There were also many other images that flooded the screen, including a baby being born, a mother breastfeeding her baby, many close-up shots of the mother's nipples and even milk being squirted from the breast and at the camera. There were red, blue and yellow hues and the images moved so fast that, at times, the film was like watching a drunk guy strap a camera to his head and then pass out on a pinball machine.

I realize that all art, especially films, is completely subjective and that what may be fully artistic to one, may be garbage to another. In my eyes, "Dog Star Man" is garbage, without question. I really hate to seem so close minded, but I sincerely could not make heads or tails of this thing and I just kept asking myself, "Why is this in THE BOOK??". "I love" how anybody can take a camera and shoot a bunch of worthless images and they get labeled as an artist. If Brakhage had a story to tell here, then why didn't he just tell it to us, instead of making us feel like someone just slipped us acid at the discotheque. This was a really hard picture to get through, add to that the fact that there isn't any sound in "Dog Star Man", which allowed my mind to wander a lot easier than if there had been sound.

Maybe there was something in there. Did you find something credible or worthwhile in "Dog Star Man"? If you did, then I BEG you to come here and leave a comment and explain the appeal, because I JUST DO NOT GET IT! Apparently there's something (I don't know if it's a movie or a documentary or what) called "The Art of Vision" that unravels "Dog Star Man" and tells the story in a linear fashion. This could be helpful in my deciphering the film or hell, even listening to the commentary may have helped out. However, I've said it before and I'll say it again - Each film gets one chance, and one chance only, to impress me. If it can't make itself seem worthwhile in one viewing, then it gets a thumbs down and gets no opportunities (like commentaries) to advance it's impression.

RATING: 1/10 I mean it, explain the appeal to me and I promise I won't judge your opinions or bash your tastes...to each his own. It seems to me that, at times, the film worked like a Rorschach painting, having no right or wrong solution and having many different ways to perceive it.

MOVIES WATCHED: 365
MOVIES LEFT TO WATCH: 636

December 12, 2011 1:36am

858. Philadelphia (1993)

Running Time: 125 minutes
Directed By: Jonathan Demme
Written By: Ron Nyswaner
Main Cast: Tom Hanks, Denzel Washington, Jason Robards, Antonio Banderas, Joanne Woodward
Click here to view the trailer

OSCAR BAIT

Last night was a night to get a little random and let my wife do the movie picking for me, as she turned to the streaming portion of Netflix and picked "Philadelphia" - the first mainstream film about AIDS/HIV, starring Tom Hanks and Denzel Washington.

Andrew Beckett (Hanks) is a hotshot lawyer working out of Philadelphia and he's just been assigned to his firm's newest and most important client. Beckett works at the law firm of Wyatt, Wheeler, Hellerman, Tetlow and Brown and none of the partners know that Andrew is a homosexual or that he has been diagnosed with AIDS. When an important document that Andrew was supposed to have delivered to the office, comes up missing, Andrew is fired for incompetence. However, Andrew suspects that the document was intentionally misplaced by his superiors, so that they could use that as an excuse to fire him, not wanting to be around him because of his illness. Andrew visits lawyer after lawyer, and no one is willing to take his case and be forced to battle Charles Wheeler (Robards) in court. Eventually Andrew knocks on the door of Joe Miller (Washington), a television attorney who is admittedly homophobic. After initially turning down Andrew, Joe runs into him weeks later at the library and agrees to take Beckett's case. From there it's a knockdown drag out in the courtroom, as Andrew's health rapidly deteriorates.

I don't really have a WHOLE LOT to say about "Philadelphia". I used the term "Oscar Bait" above, because that's exactly what this is. I've talked about movies like this before, many of which were from THE BOOK. For instance films like "Reversal of Fortune", "The King's Speech", "Saving Private Ryan" and so many others. Most of the time I'm able to overlook the obvious intentions that the filmmaker's behind these films have, to take home a little golden statue and enjoy them while they last - "Philadelphia" is no exception". I enjoyed "Philadelphia", for probably most of the same reasons that the critics and the Academy enjoyed it - because it's a very good film that tackles a very touchy subject. Many films since "Philadelphia" have tackled the subject of AIDS/HIV, but I don't think any of them have done it with the vigor that Tom Hanks put forth and I'll be damned if he didn't REALLY earn that Oscar with his portrayal of Andrew Beckett. There's a scene, right after Beckett leaves the office of Joe Miller, when he's initially denied Miller's services, where Beckett stands on the sidewalk and nearly breaks down in tears, realizing that he's helpless in his eventual fight. There's no dialogue, just a hint of music and in that scene Tom Hanks says so much without even opening his mouth. There was something very powerful in watching a black man and a gay man fight against a group of racist, yet powerful men, in the city where it was deemed that "all men are created equal".

SPOILER ALERT!

As far as the rest of the cast goes, they all range from decent to very good, with the most notable being Jason Robards and his portrayal of the bigot Charles Wheeler. I enjoy how the film doesn't suffocate us by making us spend the entire duration of the second half inside a courtroom, but rather lets us breathe between testimonies, inter-cutting courtroom scenes with other scenes, outside of the trial. Throughout the picture characters develop and not in such a way that makes it blatantly obvious that they were trying to make these people learn lessons, especially Joe Miller. It's rational that Joe Miller would begin to see life through the eyes of Andrew Beckett and maybe become less of a homophobe, which is what happens.

One last comment, before I wrap this up. I loved the ending! I loved how they showed us the very end of Andrew's life and the beginnings of it, back to back and in the reverse order. Andrew dies and at his funeral we see people watching home movies of Andrew, a toddler, playing at the beach, playing baseball and just being a kid. I don't know why, but I thought it was a brilliant way to end the picture, showing us a child who has no earthly idea what we'll ultimately come of his life, or that he'll contract this deadly, painful disease and have to fight for his respect in the midst of a courtroom.

RATING: 7.5/10 As it stands, this has a good shot of getting a mention on the "Ten Worth Mentioning" section of the TOP 20, but I really can't see it scaling that TOP 20 itself. However, who knows what I'll think when the time comes.

MOVIES WATCHED: 364
MOVIES LEFT TO WATCH: 637

December 11, 2011 10:49pm

241. The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951)

Running Time: 92 minutes
Directed By: Robert Wise
Written By: Harry Bates, Edmund H. North, from the story Farewell to the Master by Harry Bates
Main Cast: Michael Rennie, Patricia Neal, Billy Gray, Hugh Marlowe, Sam Jaffe
Click here to view the trailer

WISE WEEK: PART 3

A frequent commenter here on the blog, Ray, took a shot in the dark and predicted that I wouldn't care too much for "The Day the Earth Stood Still". In fact, the shot he took wasn't that much in the dark. I haven't been silent about my dislike toward the sci-fi genre and I really didn't expect to like this one too much either. But every once in a while, a sci-fi movie surprises me and this is one of those instances.

When the film starts, many different nations around the World are tracking a unidentified flying object (UFO), that is traveling at unearthly speeds. It doesn't take too much screen time for the saucer to finally make a landing in Washington D.C. and make it clear that this is indeed an alien spacecraft. When the door's open, out steps Klaatu (Rennie), seemingly a human being, but proclaiming to be from another planet. He is shot by a trigger happy soldier and transported to Walter Reed Hospital. Later, Klaatu makes it known that he has an important message for the entire planet of Earth and that it is necessary for him to speak to the heads of every nation. He is informed, by the Chief of Staff, that his request is impossible, due to the rising tensions in the World. Klaatu eventually escapes from the hospital and takes refuge in a boarding house, populated by a handful of guests, including Helen Benson (Neal) and her young son Bobby (Gray). Klaatu and Bobby get along wonderfully and eventually Bobby leads Klaatu to Professor Barnhardt (Jaffe), whom Klaatu sees as a wise man, who might understand his important message. Eventually the message from Klaatu becomes evident: The people of Earth will eventually begin to travel to other planets and possibly inhabit them. Since the people of Earth seem to rely so heavily on war, if they travel to other planets, alien life fear for the peace that they have been able to sustain.

I think there were equal parts of good and bad in "The Day the Earth Stood Still", but that the good was good enough to make this film worthwhile, while the bad was just nitpicky stuff. The film obviously promotes a strong anti-war message, but for me there were other messages hidden within the contents of this movie. The anti-war message is obviously a good one, because lets face it - no one likes war. Anytime you can slip that message into popular culture, like movies and television and do it cleverly enough, that's a good thing. When you take that message and you spin it together with an alien story, it becomes really interesting and you suddenly have a lot of things to think about when the film ends. There's also, in my opinion, a very clear message of racial prejudices here. When Klaatu (an alien being) arrives in Washington D.C., everyone is quick to label him as a danger and fear him, simply because he's different. It kind of mimics the day to day, social prejudices that we always hear about - people fearing/disliking men of different color, religion, ethnicity or even because they have different sexual preferences. The film also took an early jab at the media and how they have a tendency to overblow certain situations and stories. Bottom line is that the film makes a lot of bold statements and at a time when bold statements weren't so cliche.

SPOILER ALERT!

Aside from the symbolism and themes of "The Day the Earth Stood Still", lets talk about the character of Klaatu and the performance of Michael Rennie. I thought Rennie was excellent, while at the same time couldn't quite get a grasp on the actual character of Klaatu. Maybe I wasn't supposed to be able to get a grasp on this guy, because he WAS an alien and maybe we just weren't supposed to be able to relate to him. In fact, none of the characters in the film are very relateable and the film really just tells us a story, without ever letting us get really close to anybody. The other downfall of the picture is the ending, which was basically non-existent. Nothing is ever really solved and Klaatu leaves Earth not really knowing if his mission was a failure or a success. I don't think the speech at the end of the film was really quite as powerful as the filmmaker's intended and it really didn't work out as a climax at all, but simply a decent little piece of dialogue. I also didn't like how the relationship between Billy and Klaatu is never really finalized and the film ends with Klaatu leaving and with Billy left hanging, never knowing if his temporary hero had good or bad intentions.

I often talk about movies being too long or certain pictures that could have said what they needed to say in half the time they took to say it. "The Day the Earth Stood Still" was one that I could have endured for double it's running time. If you had stretched the film out to epic length, fleshed out the story and the characters a little more, I think this could've really been a mind-blowing piece of sci-fi, film history. However, as it is, the story was good enough to pull me out of the slump I've been in and the cast, most notably Michael Rennie, turned in good enough performances. I enjoyed the messages that this film preached, without the film coming off as preachy or simply a vehicle to talk about how bad war is. And hey, I'm just glad they didn't venture into a side story of a romance between Helen and Klaatu. That would've been disastrous and at times, it seemed like they were flirting with it.

RATING: 7/10 Maybe that's just me being generous, but it seems fair at the moment. I'll revisit this one at RECAP time and we'll see what happens to the rating then. "Wise Week" will conclude with "The Sound of Music", but don't expect that one until at least Monday night. Expect randomness till then, if anything at all.

MOVIES WATCHED: 363
MOVIES LEFT TO WATCH: 638

December 9, 2011 6:03pm