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SCREENING LOG
- 8/04-8/11, 2003
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I watched THE LEOPARD, KNIFE IN THE WATER, DAISIES, CUL-DE-SAC,
THE SHOP ON MAIN STREET, ROSE HOBART, SNOW WHITE (1916) and
A MAN FOR ALL SEASONS.
The first six films on this list can all easily qualify
as very good to excellent according to most criteria, and
yet I found myself much more drawn to the first three. I guess
to account for the difference is to state that there are some
films that do everything they are expected to do, in the manner
of telling a story, conveying a theme or argument, and stating
its own overall signficance in plainly appreciable terms.
Then there are some that I would readily admit to flaws in
storytelling, as well as whatever other flaws one can point
out, at least by conventional terms, but do things that defy
expectation in terms of capturing something mysterious, near-indescribable,
and challenging to one's capacities to perceive and understand,
in the most marvellously inspiring ways. In a word, that's
what I'm after. In order of preference:
The Leopard (1963, Luchino Visconti)
http://us.imdb.com/Title?0057091
ViscontiÕs 3 1Ú2 hour epic about a Sicilian Prince (Burt
Lancaster, in a heartbreaking performance) negotiating the
future of his family in the face of a new Italian regime circa
1860 is better known as being the director's most lavish and
sumptuous epic, but the true beauty of this film lies in its
smallest gestures and quietest moments. It's probably longer
and more sprawling than it needs to be, and on a narrative
level the scenes don't follow in a stricty linear sequence,
they just sort of all hang out. But there are other elements
to it that make such concerns as running time and narrative
tightness moot in my book. For me, this film has a feeling
that captures the mortal dread of a person anticipating the
cataclysmic shifts of history, with a gentle melancholy that
I've only felt in the best films of John Ford, Yasujiro Ozu,
and RUSSIAN ARK. The characters have an intimacy and rapport
with each other that I've only seen in the best films of Howard
Hawks, Ozu and once again RUSSIAN ARK. In fact I've got the
stubborn idea that the climactic ballroom scene in RUSSIAN
ARK is a bit of an homage to THE LEOPARD. It's obvious that
this film influenced Scorsese (AGE OF INNOCENCE, GANGS OF
NEW YORK), Coppola (THE GODFATHER) and Cimino (THE DEER HUNTER,
HEAVEN'S GATE) and all three of them have aimed high to match
Visconti's massive epic historic sweep, but none of them have
quite matched the lightness and gentleness of human insight
that make this film so sublime. In fact I don't think even
Visconti's other films have reached this level of sensitivity
and divine mystery.
Rose Hobart (1936, Joseph Cornell)
http://us.imdb.com/Title?0138758
Its historical signficance is cemented as the first "found"
film -- Cornell acquired a print of an unheralded B-movie
called EAST OF BORNEO, and re-edited the footage to focus
almost exclusively on shots of the film's unheralded B-movie
actress Rose Hobart, then projected it in slow motion through
a blue filter to the accompaniment of a Brazilian record,
and the results were powerful enough to make Salvador Dali
knock down the projector in a fit of envy upon its premiere.
Never mind that it was generations ahead of the experimental
filmmakers of the 50s and 60s (as well as David Lynch), the
movie still has an allure that defies description, like a
nocturnal transmission received from another planet, and rife
with interpretative possibilities. Hobart's priceless facial
expressions juxtaposed with footage of leery men, campy jungle
sets, chimpanzees, and the reflection of the moon against
ripples of water -- all of these images reflect back on each
other, creating a self-contained world, a diorama much like
Cornell's famous boxes of insignificant detritus given a whole
new life of meaning through Cornell's rearrangement.
Daisies (1966, Vera Chytilova)
http://us.imdb.com/Title?0060959
For me, what makes the great Czech films of the 60s (LOVES
OF A BLONDE, CLOSELY WATCHED TRAINS and THE SHOP ON MAIN STRET
to name some of the best) so unique is the way in which deeply
subversive sociopolitical content involving the charmingly
tragic aspirations of hapless innocents is packaged with a
sweetly melancholy, almost flippantly carefree tone. On those
terms I would argue that DAISIES, which sticks out like a
sore thumb among its more realist contemporaries, most fully
embodies the 60's Czech aesthetic by taking it to the extreme:
a pair of teens named Marie giggle their way through a series
of dinners with old men, milk baths and all-out food fights
in which phallically shaped food gets sliced under their knives.
Chytilova's sense of cinematic possibility is leagues ahead
of her male counterparts; and while in terms of narrative
her film seems to suffer in comparison, one can argue that
resisting narrative, along with every other social convention
that may possibly oppress her plucky heroines, is precisely
the point. In any event this was a lot of fun to watch --
and the epigram at the end lends all the poignancy the film
needs.
Knife in the Water (1962, Roman Polanski)
http://us.imdb.com/Title?0056291
Roman Polanski's first feature sounds as clinical and schematic
as his other 60s efforts: a bourgeois couple take a young
drifter along for a boating excursion, but the rich husband
abuses and humiliates their companion for no apparent reason
other than that he can get away with it. But despite that
the same basic power riff gets played throughout the film,
the film is never boring -- Leon Niemczyk, Jolanta Umecka,
and Zygmunt Malanowicz all contribute greatly to making this
human triangle intriguing -- and as the tension steadily builds
one keeps waiting for the big explosion of violence that never
quite happens, instead leaving lingering questions about human
motivations towards cruelty and domination over others.
The Shop on Main Street (1965, Jan Kadar, Elmar Klos)
http://us.imdb.com/Title?0059527
In Nazi-run Slovakia a humble handyman is promoted to become
"Aryan controller" of a button shop run by an elderly Jewess;
a friendship predictably blossoms between them but the riveting
climax of the film faces the hard questions of national identity
and personal responsibility in the face of fascism head on,
while steering well clear of sentimentality (well, almost).
The film, with its clumsy Everyman protagonist and his do-gooder
personally put to the test, consciously invites comparison
to Chaplin, and earns it mostly in the second half, where
the whimsical tone of the film gives way to a groundswell
of impending doom, a unique and moving mixture of conflicting
emotional registers. Personally I thought Ida Kaminska played
the old lady for schtick -- I was more impressed with Josef
Kroner's sustained performance of good-natured beleaguerment.
A Man for All Seasons (1966, Fred Zinnemann) second
viewing
http://us.imdb.com/Title?0060665
Sir Thomas More gets packaged and sold as Britain's answer
to Atticus Finch in this thoroughly respectable film of Robert
Bolt's thoroughly respectable play. The story is graced with
Bolt's clever dialogues as More tries to navigate between
his loyalty to Henry VIII and his own principles; the exterior
shots are gorgeous to look at (the way this movie photographs
the surface of water has stayed with me since I was a child);
and the story moves like clockwork as it advances its hero's
ideals for the enlightenment of all. I actually would have
liked it more if More (played by Paul Scofield with more stoic
righteousness than even Gary Cooper could muster after three
bowls of Wheaties) was put on less of a pedestal by the film;
by the end of his inquisition youÕd think he was the second
coming of Christ. Instead of nailing him to the cross, they
should have done more to nail him against the wall, esp. when
it comes to justifying his choice to his family, who provide
the film with its liveliest moments, yet they accept his martyrdom
with the good-natured sobs of a sitcom household.
Snow White (1916, J. Searle Dawley)
http://us.imdb.com/Title?0007361
Delightful silent version of the Grimm fairy tale (reportedly
this is the version that Walt Disney saw as a youth and would
later inspire his own animated feature). Dorothy Cumming played
the virgin princess at age 34 and yet pulls it off, with the
help of a lot of onscreen charm and Melies-inspired hocus
pocus throughout the proceedings.
Cul-de-Sac (1966, Roman Polanski)
http://us.imdb.com/Title?0060268
Two gangsters hole up in a remote island castle occupied
by a recluse and his young attractive wife, and the mindgames
commence. Polanski has long referred to this as his best film,
probably because the sparse, near-theatrical confines of the
story allowed him to explore the power dynamics among his
characters with less distraction than in any of his other
films. With its rambling dialogues it's slightly less contrived
(but no less misogynistic) than REPULSION; in any case I simply
didn't care for any of the characters enough to invest myself
in his psychological preoccupations, which more often than
not strike me as frigidly academic.
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