Saturday, March 22, 2008

I'm on a roll

After my last update I felt the urge to continue being good about updating. It'll probably still take me quite awhile to be all the way caught up and be current with my movie watching. But this is good...I'm motivated.

  1. The Crowd was not an easy film to get a hold of, it hasn't been released on DVD yet and Rocket Video was fresh out of VHS copies of it. It was finally on TCM (woo TCM). I don't know what I would do without my Time Warner equivalent to TiVo and TCM. I really enjoy King Vidor as a director and was very interested in the plot. Very sad, but also very interesting.
  2. The LA Public Library (downtown branch) came through for me for The Docks of New York. This was a gritty film, I found the story interesting, but none of the lead characters were likable. The man guy was a bit of a bastard and the main woman was a little bit of a snot.
  3. An Andalusian Dog was a tough one for me to watch. Here's some backstory,I have a very strong, passionate dislike for all things eye-ball related. So when I saw the cover art I knew I would have issues. I respect the artistic integrity of a film like this, but I think it just wasn't for me. It felt like I was caught in someone else's bad dream. Maybe that's what they were going for, if so kudos to Luis Bunuel and Salvador Dali!
  4. The Passion of Joan of Arc was another one of those films that I felt while it did have merit was a bit boring. Don't get me wrong I did appreciate the simplicity and the story telling, and the lead actress was phenomenal. I did like the use of close-ups and lack of make-up.
  5. More Buster Keaton YAY!!! Steamboat Bill Jr. Such a great film, it contains the famous front of a house falling down on Buster but he remains unscathed gag. Very funny, and a cute love story to boot.
  6. Maybe I'm not fit to talk about films, cause I don't love all these old films with technical merit, I mean I do see why they're influential, but I just find them horribly boring and not that interesting....that was the case with Storm Over Asia. I didn't enjoy it and don't really have much else to say about it.
  7. I really enjoyed this Hitchcock film, although it might not be fair, I kind of like all Hitchcock films, but still Blackmail is really excellent for a number of reasons. It shows the potential that was to come from Mr. Hitchcock, while still standing on it's own as a film. There is a great amount of suspense, like all good Hitchcock films and you want the 'bad guy' to get away with it. Great film.
  8. Another weird film here, with elements that are influential and interesting. The Man with the Movie Camera felt like a montage of weird events, strange documentary.
  9. I enjoyed Pandora's Box, I liked that the story took twists and turns, had ups and downs. And while the lead female character was fundamentally unlikable you were still able to care a bit about what happened to her. At this point I've seen some of these movies about 9 months ago or more so.... I kind of can't comment on too many specifics. I wish I had been better about this, but this is why I'm trying to catch up now and get up to date so I can blog about movies I've watched recently instead of trying to remember.
  10. The Blue Angel was an interesting film and I can see how Marlene Dietrich's career took off after a movie like that. The subject matter was a bit raunchy for the time, a college professor pining after a lady of the night.....how controversial for 1930.

Alright I think that's enough for this post, I hope I get up to date soon....I'll be working on it.

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