World Cinema

[Irene Wilde]

Two of my more recent favorites that I neglected:

Los Diarios de la Motocicleta
Y Tu Mama Tambien

Yes, they both feature the eye-candy that is Gael García Bernal, but they are also very good films.

[metin]

Originally Posted by saliotthomas

I loved the part when Vincent (cant remenber is name further!) act the part of the plane chase in the alfred Hitchcock film.

The part I liked the most in that movie is when the guy, watching the Godfather-2 (where Mike and Fredo argues) repeats the lines.

[Irene Wilde]

I have gradually been transferring my videotapes on to DVD, and this week I came across two that I thought were particularly appropriate for this forum.

The first, and far superior, is Le Salaire de la Peur, the one from 1953 with Yves Montand, based on the novel by George Arnaud. The plot is simple, four diverse yet equally desperate men accept a job driving trucks loaded with explosives across the dilapidated roads of a South American country to an oil field that has caught fire. It is a suicide mission, but anyone who is successful earns enough to escape the dead-end life each has been living. This film is a masterpiece.

The second, and I hesitate to mention it but it is in keeping with the theme of this forum is Night on Earth, from 1991 with an international cast by...dare I say it? Jim Jarmusch. Yes, I know he has his detractors, but this series of taxi cab vignettes, all taking place within the same time in various cities from Los Angeles to Helsinki, to me, still holds up, Robert Benigni's taxi cab confession is still funny, and Matti Pellonpää's face and voice are still compelling. I'll take my beating now, please.

The common thread of these two uncommon films is the use and mix of languages. Between them they use English, French, Spanish, Italian, Finnish, and I believe smatterings of Dutch, German, and Swedish.

[saliotthomas]

Le salaire de la peur in a great film,and been French on you see once a years a least but alway with renewed joy.Not like Les gendarmes a St Tropez five time a year more like.

I also love Jarmush,most of his excellent.I find a bit in the same line as Cassavetes(with more humour).

[Irene Wilde]

Last night was a François Truffaut double feature:

La Nuit Americaine -- the backstage chaos of a seven-week film shoot and all the dramas, foibles, missteps, and mistakes that happen along the way when you through a large number of creative people together of a short, but intense, project. Also, Truffaut manages small tributes to the many filmmakers that inspired him if you pay attention.

Tirez sur le Pianiste -- Truffaut playing around with the conventions of the American gangster picture. A gifted pianist has run away from his life of grand concerts and easy living, hiding out in a dive bar until one of his criminal brothers comes in one night, pulling the piano player into what seems to be his inevitable fate. Charles Aznavour is a treat in the lead as a Bogart-like character, and I especially love the scene where he and his Bacall-like lady friend are walking down the mean city streets at night in matching trench coats.

[Irene Wilde]

Yesterday, I was recording À Bout de Souffle, and I tried to watch it but I was under the influence of muscle relaxants and couldn't manage it. Still, it's the French New Wave film, and Jean-Paul Belmondo is wonderful in the lead. The script is by Truffaut and Jean-Luc Godard, who also directed. Nearly 50 years after its release, it still epitomizes cool.

[saliotthomas]

Originally Posted by Irene Wilde

Yesterday, I was recording À Bout de Souffle, and I tried to watch it but I was under the influence of muscle relaxants and couldn't manage it. Still, it's the French New Wave film, and Jean-Paul Belmondo is wonderful in the lead. The script is by Truffaut and Jean-Luc Godard, who also directed. Nearly 50 years after its release, it still epitomizes cool.

Pierro le fou is another good one(the face painted in blue) with Bebel as he is known in France.

I was wandering if you know of "les tontons flingueurs" a classic of the 50's with dialogue of Michelle Audiard.A culte movie with pearls of old slang.Unforgettable scene in a kitchen when a band of hitman try to determine what come in the home brewed alcohol they found in a cupboard.Saldy nearly impossible to translate.

[Irene Wilde]

Les Tontons Flingueurs is one of the films I've been looking for on my video shelf. I know the scene you mentioned. Haven't come across it yet in the archives, but it will turn up, along with all my Italians, eventually. When it does I'll post something. My video shelf takes up an entire wall and it's three tapes deep. I keep it as organized as I keep everything else, unfortunately, so who knows when I'll find a particular film.

As for Pierrot le Fou, I haven't seen it yet, but I'll get there one day, I'm sure. There's an interesting relationship between Hollywood films and French films, much like American rock music and British rock music. There's a reinterpretation and instead of something getting lost in translation, something is added. Take Truffaut, for instance, he was so influenced by American film, and yet his style is like a fingerprint it's so unique and couldn't have come from America.

Next up is either going to be Kurasawa's Dreams or Belle du Jour because they are the ones I can find on the shelf.

[Eric]

Carry on Matron, screened tonight (12th-13th July 2008) on the BBC is a work of genius. Made in 1972, it is, of course, one of a series of comedy films with which generations of Britons are familiar. The wacky, sometimes slapstick, fun is there, the acting is good, the plot is a bit corny, but hangs together.

So, where's the genius? The genius is in the innuendo and expert, quick-fire use of the colloquial English language. Almost every stretch of dialogue in the whole film contains expressions, puns, hints and so on that are intimately connected with the English language of the era the film, and all the other "Carry on..." films, was made.

The script of this film could be used to great effect as a test of English proficiency. Because although the film itself is "just a bit of fun", it would be very interesting to see how many of the innuendos and instances of double entendre were picked up by people from North America, let alone Europe.

A thoroughly British film. A supreme challenge for the subtitles translator into other languages.

[Irene Wilde]

Back in the days when I experimented with my own forum, we had a thread called "Barbara Windsor's Tits."

[Sybarite]

Originally Posted by Irene Wilde

Back in the days when I experimented with my own forum, we had a thread called "Barbara Windsor's Tits."

Weren't they called Ronnie and Reggie?

The Carry Ons – well, the early ones – are huge fun. Carry on Cleo remains a personal favourite and, of course, has one of cinema's great lines, spoken by Kenneth Williams as Julius Ceasar: "Infamy, infamy ... they've all got it infamy".

It's a crying shame that the British have just let our film industry pretty much die. We produced a whole range of films, from the Carry Ons to the Doctor in Clover/Paradise etc, to kitchen sink dramas, to things such as If and Victim and The Servant. Then there are the Ealing comedies (Ladykillers still remains an absolute gem of dark humour).

But it has pretty much all stopped, and it appears that British cinema audiences primarily want Hollywood mainstream films that aren't likely to challenge the mind at all, but simply provide special effects eye candy.

It's something that I always notice on the Continent – you see a cinema and, while there'll be one or two Hollywood films showing, there'll also be homegrown options and films from elsewhere in Europe.

[Irene Wilde]

Let Him Have It is a great film, and I love Mike Leigh's films. Guy Ritchie's Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels was good, but his follow-up, Snatch, was disappointing.

Ladykillers is brilliant. And I have to mention Bunny Lake is Missing because Noel Coward plays such a lovely pervert in that film.

[Sybarite]

Have you ever seen 10 Rillington Place? A brilliant, really creepy performance from Richard Attenbrough.

If you haven't seen it, I'd really recommend Victim (1961), which is almost polemic. It's apparently considered responsible for helping trigger the major debate that eventually (six years later) saw the decriminalisation of homosexuality in the UK, and it was one of the first films where you can see just what a fine screen actor Dirk Bogarde was.

[Irene Wilde]

I've just put them both on the list. Brit films, unless they star Daniel Radcliffe, can be very hard to find in the US. Thank goodness for Amazon!

[Sybarite]

Originally Posted by Irene Wilde

I've just put them both on the list. Brit films, unless they star Daniel Radcliffe, can be very hard to find in the US. Thank goodness for Amazon!

I really hope you enjoy them, Irene.

There have been so many excellent British films – and we don't even appreciate our own cinema half the time.

That's not to say that I don't like any Hollywood (or US) films, I hasten to add. I'll always have a soft spot for the sheer undiluted escapism of the original Star Wars films and Indiana Jones trilogy, for instance, while I love a great many of the class era films – pretty much anything with Humphrey Bogart in, for starters.

More recently, I like what I've seen of the Coen brothers (their Ladykillers is the exception), while Cradle Will Rock was good too.

And, in the spirit of good links, I was just looking at iTunes to consider buying a film for my holidays next month – and spotted The Paper Chase, which I haven't seen for years. It wasn't a bad TV series either – both film and TV show starred the wonderful John Houseman, who is a character in Cradle Will Rock, played by Cary Elwes.

[Irene Wilde]

The US can still make some fine films, usually smaller, independent things, but the lines have gotten so blurred lately, it's hard to say what is really "independent" anymore. But we also make an awful lot of crap and unfortunately, the crap has a bigger marketing budget, gets a wider audience, and gets exported to the rest of the world as representative of American cinema. Hence, Transformers gets played on thousands of screens around the globe, and Brokeback Mountain plays to an audience of 12 on one screen at one theatre in my neighborhood -- well, 11 really -- one person walked out about the time Heath Ledger spit in his hand.

Meanwhile, here in the US, and I'm afraid I'm going to sound like Mr. Dickens for a moment, there still holds a popular conception that Americans have an aversion to subtitles, which I don't think is all that true, but it still seems to limit what is available in popular release. People who enjoy cinema regardless of language are either condemned to schlepping across town to the one of a handful of "art house" theatres or waiting for the DVD release. Okay, stepping off my soapbox now. Fortunately, like I said, there's amazon or netflix to fill the gaps.

[Sybarite]

Originally Posted by Irene Wilde

... People who enjoy cinema regardless of language are either condemned to schlepping across town to the one of a handful of "art house" theatres or waiting for the DVD release. Okay, stepping off my soapbox now. Fortunately, like I said, there's amazon or netflix to fill the gaps.

~~nods head in recognition~~

I'd say that's very much the case over here too. And that's coming from someone living in London. Very few foreign-language films get major releases in the UK.

To be honest, I don't know whether people are averse to foreign films, to more 'serious' (sometimes) films or to the actual process of reading subtitles – or whether it's simply a lack of opportunity.

Mind, if someone had told me 10 years ago that I'd spend money to go to a cinema to see silent movies, I'd have told them that they were daft.

[Irene Wilde]

Many years ago, when I was young and had no responsibilities, I practically lived in a revival theatre near my home. A particularly fond memory of those times is seeing a Chaplin double feature in a theatre full of people. It was magic sharing the laughter with a hundred or so people.

[Sybarite]

Originally Posted by Irene Wilde

Many years ago, when I was young and had no responsibilities, I practically lived in a revival theatre near my home. A particularly fond memory of those times is seeing a Chaplin double feature in a theatre full of people. It was magic sharing the laughter with a hundred or so people.

Sounds a wonderful time.

I've never particularly 'got' Chaplin, while Laurel & Hardly pretty much leave me cold as a result of my father forcing my sister and I to sit through endless re-runs of his three 8-reel films of theirs. I do, however, love Keaton – an absolute genius. Steamboat Bill stands up today as a work of comic brilliance.

The silent films that particularly drew me to the cinema were German expressionist films, mostly by the director GW Pabst, after I'd been to several of his films in a season at the National Film Theatre – Pandora's Box and The Joyless Street were the silents, plus Westfront 1918 and The Threepenny Opera – followed shortly thereafter by Fritz Lang's Metropolis, complete with proper, live piano accompaniment. I'd never thought that a silent drama could hold my attention – but now I have quite a collection at home (mostly German expressionism). Earlier this year, I went to the Barbican in London to see Eisentein's Battleship Potemkin, with a specially written score and performed live by the Pet Shop Boys and the London Symphony Orchestra. It was a fascinating artistic experience.

[Irene Wilde]

Originally Posted by Sybarite

Sounds a wonderful time.

I've never particularly 'got' Chaplin, while Laurel & Hardly pretty much leave me cold as a result of my father forcing my sister and I to sit through endless re-runs of his three 8-reel films of theirs. I do, however, love Keaton – an absolute genius. Steamboat Bill stands up today as a work of comic brilliance.

The silent films that particularly drew me to the cinema were German expressionist films, mostly by the director GW Pabst, after I'd been to several of his films in a season at the National Film Theatre – Pandora's Box and The Joyless Street were the silents, plus Westfront 1918 and The Threepenny Opera – followed shortly thereafter by Fritz Lang's Metropolis, complete with proper, live piano accompaniment. I'd never thought that a silent drama could hold my attention – but now I have quite a collection at home (mostly German expressionism). Earlier this year, I went to the Barbican in London to see Eisentein's Battleship Potemkin, with a specially written score and performed live by the Pet Shop Boys and the London Symphony Orchestra. It was a fascinating artistic experience.

A friend of mine attended the Battleship Potemkin thing in London as well.

Speaking of Metropolis an extended version was recently discovered in someone's closet in South America or something and should be released on DVD soon. I love that one, Pandora's Box and Das Cabinet des Dr. Caligari. And, of course, can't forget Der Blaue Engel -- lovely Marlene!

Like I said, I'm hoping this forum will help me as grow as familiar with books from around the world as I have become with films.