Vanilla Sky is one of Marie's all time favorite flicks, so we watched it last night. It's been years since I've seen it.
It was really good. Still is. It's got a Ferrari 250GTO and a 67 Mustang in it. What's not to love? Plus, Crowe uses Vanilla Sky to make quite a few allusions to Jules et Jim and Breathless. It's all good, nerdy shit. Incredibly detail oriented. You can get lost down a rabbit hole if you really want to analyze it. Marie said the Director's Commentary is very illuminating. I choose to take the film at face value, though. When Tech Support does his exposition at the end...I'm just going with that. I don't care to read anything else into it.
Good soundtrack. Great editing. Great cinematography. Even though Tom Cruise is an Scientologist idiot, he's a great actor. Truth. Jason Lee is always funny. Penelope Cruze is...well, she's Penelope Cruze so that's a reason in and of itself to see the movie again.
There's a cameo by Steven Spielberg. I just found that amusing for some reason.
Vanilla Sky holds up and it's worth another viewing if you haven't seen it in a few years. Great movie to finish the year off with.
Marie bought me "1" on blu-ray for x-mas. It's a new documentary on Formula One racing.
On the one hand there are a lot of good things about this doc. But on the other hand, I had a couple bones to pick.
The good: Very high production value. Dynamic editing. Interviews from many of the greats. Good archival footage. Music is legit. It's narrated by Michael Fassbender.
The bad: The movie seemed like it was just taking you from one crash to the next with filler content in between. We know there are a lot of crashes (and deaths in the old days), but this was overkill (pun intended). The thread seemed to follow crashes and how they improved safety over the years. But that's not really a good focal point for an F1 doc. How about...the cars, the drivers, the glamour, the teams, the personalities, the technology? I'd like to see that a lot more. Also, it took you from the inception through about 1996. For a movie made in 2012 why did it stop in 1996?
So I didn't think it was a good movie to show someone who's not all that familiar with F1. I enjoyed it. It was fast-paced and well-made. I just thought the focus was too sensational and it would have been much better served if they had focused on something other than accidents.
Still recommended, just with a bit of caution. If you love F1, watch it. :)
Had the rare treat of watching a movie with my wife these days. We settled on Purple Noon. One of my DVDs I've been meaning to re-watch. It has Alain Delon, it's from 1960, and it's based on the novel "The Talented Mr. Ripley." Marie was down.
Of course it's super good. The story is superb, the acting is excellent, wardrobe is amazing, and the editing was great. The movie knocks it outta the park.
I dug the US adaptation of the book, too. But this one edges it out, to be honest. It's enveloping.
I put the book in my Amazon cart. Something to read down the line.
Seriously, how amazing is this movie? I just added the original book to my Amazon cart. I'm sure I'll read that...after I read Papillon. ;)
I got the Blu-Ray for x-mas last year and I finally got around to watching it as well as checking out the extras. As I'm sure you know, The Great Escape is based on a true story. Although Sturges obviously took some liberties for the sake of the silver screen, it's still actually very accurate. The shit in the movie that they do...it's fucking amazing but it was pulled off by the soldiers in the camp. It's incredible.
Just like Papillon, movies from the 60's sure make prison and war look awfully fucking romantic and bad-ass. Like it wasn't anything to be in a prison camp or stuck in the cooler for a month. Ain't no thang. Well, when you're Steve McQueen everything looks pretty effortless...so...
All-star cast. Three hours of suspense. If you haven't seen it, seriously bro, get on it.
Great cinematography. Good editing. Very classic score for the era. It's perfect for what it is.
Except for the accents...yeah...some pretty fucking bad accents going on here. But we can ignore that.
Here's an interesting one. The Black Six. Part blaxploitation, part biker flick.
We watched this for the last Motorcycle Movie Night and it got some surprisingly good feedback. Some people said it was the best biker movie they'd seen yet. Personally, it's nowhere near the best, but I get what they're saying. See, a common thread in biker movies is a complete lack of plot. But The Black Six had a very cohesive, linear plot. It made perfect sense, which is something you never say when watching a movie like this. So in that regard it's one of the 2 or 3 we've ever seen that actually made sense.
But that didn't make it great.
It stars six black american football athletes. So right there you know the acting is just as bad as any other 60's biker flick. Their supporting cast are just as terrible. So much either wooden or ham acting...oh man. But that's the charm, right?
Great intro music. It's a blaxploitation wah-wah fest ala Shaft. Super good. The Black Six all ride Triumphs, too. Which is sometimes comical given how large a couple of these lads are.
HERE BE SPOILERS:
The movie is about a black dude dating a white chick in a little hillbilly town. White chick's brother is a redneck and his motorcycle gang buddies kill the black dude. The black dude's brother is in the Black Six. They come back to town and settle the score with the rednecks who killed his brother. ------End of spoilers. Like anyone cares if I spoil a blaxploitation biker flick-----
I really liked how CHILL The Black Six were. Due to their non-acting background they just couldn't really inject any dynamism or drama into their roles, so they come off super laid back. It's actually pretty awesome. The complete opposite of white guy bikers. Now, part of this laid back attitude is certainly intended because they're just smooooooth. But part of it is a consequence of not being able to act. It's great, though.
Of all the bikers we've seen in movies this is definitely the gang you'd wanna hang out with.
As far as biker cliches go it was missing swastikas and rape. But it had an interesting take on incompetent local fuzz. It had bar fights, racism, and biker gangs 'terrorizing' a small town. Decent amount of open road scenes. No love in in the desert, though. Still, it was definitely a legit biker flick. But unlike any you've seen. Different perspective.
Anyway, this was a good take on the genre. Keep the shiny side up...
Eric told me about this documentary. It's about guitar pedals. He neglected to tell me the documentary is shitty.
I watched it over a couple lunch breaks at work, hoping there would be this ONE sequence that made the whole thing worthwhile. It never came. It's pretty much a dude interviewing some pedal makers with a camcorder. It doesn't appear to be edited in any logical order.
If I were in prison I'd probably find some other shit to do before resigning myself to watching this movie. Maybe go cornrow some dude's hair.
J Mascis...that guy is a fucking human sloth. Look at this random clip on youtube.
Marie wanted to watch this documentary on the beginnings of yoga in the Western World. And we did. Reflecting on it we both agreed it was interesting but honestly not a very good documentary from an artistic point of view.
This is a doc made by a German dude (or maybe he's Austrian, I don't know) who gets into yoga through his wife. He really digs it so he decides to track down some pupils and descendants of T. Krishnamacharya, the legendary Indian yogi who brought yoga to the West. He interviews them about what it was like back in the 30's and 40's and that's about it. It's honestly more like a well-edited holiday video than a legitimate documentary.
Whether you're just curious about yoga or you're diehard about it, it's definitely worth watching because you'll probably nerd out on it. But it won't win any fucking awards for artistic merit. There are better movies to watch.
Now tell me what kind of movie this is. A biker flick, you say? Ohhhhh no. That's a cunning ruse to suck you in. Quite literally all of the biker action is in the three minute trailer. There isn't a roar of a bike anywhere else in this whole film. They just marketed it as such. We kicked off this season's Motorcycle Movie Night with this flick and the Flying Skülls were pissed! Well, it was actually pretty freakin entertaining regardless of the lack of bikers. But this is a biker movie night, not a generic grindhouse night. There are standards that need to be upheld!
Needless to say I was quite disappointed that this wasn't actually a biker flick. And if you removed the bikers from the film it would have actually made a little more sense. What kind of flick is it? It's fucking confused. Part James Bond, part cop movie, part gangster movie, and part pseudo-biker. It's all very strange and none of it is woven together with any inkling of skill.
We had a hard time figuring out who was who or what was honestly going on. There are neo-Nazis counterfeiting money, Israeli spies out to get the Nazis, undercover cops, gangsters and lots of hot chicks. I'll give it that. Lots of hot mommas.
Oh yeah, and lots of Fords. They seemed to have struck up a deal with Ford for gratuitous product placement. Cool shit.
The thing that made most people's night was the fact that there's a cameo by the real deal Colonel Sanders from KFC. It happens for no reason whatsoever. Again, keen marketing ploy I assume.
I'm bashing this film cuz it's totally misleading. BUT we've definitely seen worse biker flicks. So where it lacks in bikers, it makes up in good ol' fashioned entertainment.
Hitchhiking must have been so fucking awesome in the 60's and 70s.
I ended up with a copy of the Black Gestapo because it was a double feature on a grindhouse disc I bought with the Black Six. I picked it up for the latter, which is a film I'll screen this season for Motorcycle Movie Night.
What can I say about the Black Gestapo? It's from 75, the cars are awesome, the score is filled with wah-pedals, and there's a really hot chick in it. The production and acting are terrible, lighting and sound are crap, it's just a shit movie. But I was somewhat entertained by it all nonetheless. I could never recommend that anyone spend time to watch it...but I was alright with it. I'm sitting at home waiting to go to the hospital for a procedure, so I needed to kill some time.
Oh yeah, the poster is rad.
It's about white gangsters extorting the black citizens of Watts. So a black people's army fights back against the whites. But then the black soldiers just start extorting the black citizens even worse than the whites did. Wah-pedals, Cadillacs, guns, karate, and afros ensue. White people die. Black people die. There's a whole lot of fightin' goin' on. Yeah...
I came across this flick on Netflix. It's a documentary about the last year of Polaroid film. Seemed like a light flick I could check out so I did...
The doc interviews a variety of photographers and artists who are heavy Polaroid users. One of them being none other than John Waters. I don't dig his films but the dude is freakin entertaining. The whole premise of the film is that Polaroid is shutting its doors, there are people who love the film, so what the fuck are they gonna do now that it's gone?
Well, I won't tell you because that wouldn't be very sporting of me. But it's an interesting look at the corporation, the people who love the film, and what fruit is born from that love.
The doc is well done. The biggest takeaway for me on any film like this is always the passion of the artists involved. It's always profoundly powerful when people are moved to tears, to action, and sometimes to risk their lives for the sake of art and expression. Very cool, man.
I just read Jackie Chan's bio. It got me in the mood for some Jackie Chan action so I put in a flick I haven't seen in 25 years...Project A. And boy was it good!
At first I was buuuuuuuuumed cuz it was fucking dubbed. It was a cheap DVD and I didn't even think twice. So yeah, that kinda sucked. But once I got over the initial shock I got right back into it like I was 10 years old again.
Project A is set in late 18th century Hong Kong and it's about pirates. So right off the bat you know this isn't your run of the mill kung fu flick. By this time Jackie had gained clout and was starting to make the films HE wanted to make. This is golden era Jackie Chan: he wrote, directed and starred in it, and his co-stars were his old buddies from the Chinese Opera Theatre...Samo Hung and Yuen Biao.
It's full of physical humor ala Charlie Chaplin and Buster Keaton. Jackie does some BIG stunts and so does his incredible cast. Three quarters of the film is pretty much punching, kicking, and jumping. It's fucking amazing. The physicality of his films are unparalleled. He's a true inspiration. Mad respect.
If you like kung fu and you have a sense of humor then you can't go wrong with this. It's awesome. Even when it's dubbed.
Design is One is a documentary about Massimo and Lella Vignelli. You don't know them but you definitely know their art. Everything from the NY MTA wayfinding signage to the American Airlines logo to the Bloomingdale's logo. Ducati, Ford, JCPenny, United Colors of Benetton, Knoll...the list is endless. Their influence is profound. It's shocking.
They design anything and everything from clothes to furniture to buildings to logos to corporate identities to housewares to whatever.
If you saw the Helvetica documentary you were probably amused by Massimo's interviews. He's very passionate and very straightforward, but without being a dick. He's opinionated, but approachable. Funny dude. Talented as fuck.
So, this is a doc focusing on their design impact. I recommend it to anyone who cares about aesthetics. Period.
I've waited 25 years for this! The Director's Cut of Nightbreed is finally here.
I pre-ordered this blu-ray as soon as I was aware of it and watched it as soon as it was delivered. Nightbreed came out in 1990 and mesmerized my ten year old brain. I loved it. I related to it. I played the video game on Commie 64. And looking at that now...man, kids today have no idea. But I digress...
The movie was based on Clive Barker's book, "Cabal." He had just directed two very successful Hellraiser flicks and this was his next movie. But this was different. This was a story that placed humanity as the devil. The humans were evil. The "monsters" were sympathetic. The "monsters" were the good guys. It flipped everything upside down. But that didn't jive with the suits in Hollywood. They "couldn't" market Clive's original artistic intent, they needed to cut the film and sell it as a slasher to make money. So they brutalized Barker's vision and fucked his film over royally. Twenty-five years later, and now the film has a proper release that's much closer to Clive's original intent. There are 40 new minutes of footage. Some major sub-plots have been reinstated that totally change the complexion and denouement of the film. It's a huge fucking difference.
As a ten year old I didn't know any of this and I loved the movie for what it was. But now it's a lot sweeter to bask in the nostalgia, but with an even BETTER version than the one I remember.
The new Director's Cut blu-ray has over an hour and a half of documentary footage on the disc plus an intro to the film by Clive.
There's actually a three disc version I just found out about. That version has even more extras including 20 more minutes of footage. Probably from the "Cabal Cut" that's floating out there. So if you're hardcore enough...track down that version.
Marie bought me a couple McQueen blu-rays last Christmas. I was very stoked to get the Great Escape and Papillon. Both tremendous films. I hit up Starbucks last night and popped in the three hour Papillon for another viewing.
God damn, it's good. Steve McQueen and Dustin Hoffman star as two French prisoners sent to a penal colony in French Guyana in the 30's. It's based on an autobiography that has come under much criticism for its authenticity and dubious content. "Papillon", the author, allegedly embellished much of it, straight up stole other prisoners' stories and claimed them as his own, and threw in a dash of what actually happened to him. The result was a wildly successful novel/bio about a wrongly-convited man who escaped from the unescapable. An innocent man fucked by the shitty French penal system. But an innocent man who beat the shitty French penal system, escaped, and lived for a couple decades as a free man and a hero. Vive la France.
Dustin Hoffman plays a famous counterfeiter and does an excellent job. McQeen is Papillon and is somewhat upstaged by Hoffman if you ask me. But McQueen is still super cool. Probably one of his best moments. This flick is like the 1973 version of Mesrine. If you liked that (which you better have fucking liked) then watch this. This is the clear ancestor and grand-daddy of Mesrine. It's killer, man. So damn good.
The score does a good job heightening the action, the cinematography is particularly good, and the editing is well-paced and dramatic. It's a very artistic film with plenty of integrity. It really stands the test of time. Hollywood could never churn out a three hour flick like this nowadays. Schaffner does a great job exploiting every last minute of film stock.
I loved this. Just bought the novel on Amazon for $2 and I'm gonna watch the extras shortly.
My favorite prison break movies are all French. Mesrine, Papillon, and Le Trou. Go figure.
Alice Cooper is one of those acts who has never grown out of favor with me. I've been a huge fan since '90. That sounds crazy but that's about when Trash came out and that was THE album that got me into him. Then Hey Stoopid came out in '91 and I was singing about "meet my libido, he's such a psycho" and I had no idea what the fuck that meant. I just knew the chorus was about Frankenstein's monster and that was cool when you're 10 or 11.
Anyway, Alice Cooper rules hard and I've been a fan for 25 years now. Of course I'm gonna buy the new doc that Sam Dunn just put out. He's the Canadian hesher responsible for Iron Maiden Flight 666, Metal: A Headbanger's Journey, and Global Metal (all of which I also own). It's all good shit.
This year at work our theme is Nightmares and my team is doing Alice Cooper "Welcome to My Nightmare" as the theme. I watched this flick to help get some ideas for whatever we come up with. I like the idea of dropping panties from a helicopter. I'll have to recreate that at work somehow...
Getting back to the doc...
There are no talking heads. All interviews are done off camera. It's just VO's from the people who were there on top of archival footage. It's woven together in more of a present-tense format instead of a retrospective format. The doc starts with Vincent in high school and ends in 1986, 18 years after "I'm Eighteen." It's somewhat of a rise and fall and rise again story.
I definitely learned a lot. I wonder if Alice has a bio? I should get that if he does...
This doc is good but it didn't get me as psyched as I expected. Flight 666 makes the hair on your arms stand up. Every time. It's electric. It's just more kinetic. For being as crazy as Cooper is, this doc is somehow mellow and subdued. It could have done with some sort of jolt in the storytelling. Maybe some other more animated VO's. It's just kind of mellow. Probably because Alice is in his 60's and he's told these stories a million times.
I'd watch this on Netflix when it comes out unless you're a diehard then go ahead and get the blu-ray.
Can't remember how I got onto the subject of Kraturock but for some reason I looked up Amon Düül II on YouTube. I think I was reading Iron Fist or Decibel or some shit like that. Anyway, I checked out the aforementioned Germans and really dug it. Far out shit like Kraftwerk meets Hawkwind. Perfect combo! Totally bizarre. So I thought it was about time I checked out more Krautrock proper. I've dug Kraftwerk for years now. I fuckin love em. But I need to dig deeper.
I ran past Flipside on Tuesday and picked up a couple Tangerine Dream LP's from Uberti. Dig.
Then I gave Henry Pardike a holler and asked him for some recommendations as he's a musical oracle. He passed along a link to this documentary that focuses on the big name bands like Tangerine Dream, Can, Neu!, Kraftwerk, Amon Düül II and Faust, etc. I watched it at lunch today.
If your'e a total n00b to the scene like I am, this is a decent place to start. It's even got some Iggy Pop interview footage in it so you can't bitch about your 58 minutes too much.
I'm looking forward to getting some more LPs from this genre, but it's definitely going to be hit or miss. All these bands are very experimental. Very temperamental. So you'll have to do your research to find out what era of each band is good and what is just a couple krauts banging some saucepans together, fiddling with a random tone generator and calling it music. I think Tangerine Dream alone have over 100 albums...
You should watch this if you don't know anything about Krautrock. Hell, even if you do you'll still find it interesting.
Marie and I both wanted to check this out, so she made some popcorn and we watched it last night.
An Oscar nominated doc about an old artistic Japanese couple? You know that's my shit. If that doesn't sound like it'd be your jam then stay away. This is what it is.
The most incredible part is how spirited and vital the 80 year old Ushio Shinohara is. The dude is a machine! Very inspiring. Looks like a life of drinking and shirking fathering responsibilities keeps one young in mind and young in body. Righteous.
One of my coworkers told me about this one. Jackie Stewart hanging out with Roman Polanski in Monaco in 71. What's not to love?!
Polanski was a big F1 fan at the time so he produced this flick. It's fly-on-the-wall footage surrounding the three days of practice / qualifying / racing at the 71 Monaco GP. It's pretty much all Jackie Stewart. You get an all access view of what it was like to be around him at the time. Having dinner with the likes of Graham Hill and Ringo Starr. Surrounded by HOT ASS SEVENTIES CHICKS. Everywhere, man.
Jackie did quite alright marrying Helen, that's for sure.
Anyway, if you dig racing you should definitely watch this. If not, I wouldn't check it out cuz I think it's too technical and potentially alienating if you don't care about F1. I thought it was pretty freakin cool. A great glimpse at a bygone era.
Got introduced to Lavell Crawford many years ago on BET. Dude was funny as fuuuuuck. In a sense he's a physical comedian...but he only uses his face. Just look at it. Alllll of it. The dude has gotta be like 400 lbs.
Anyway, years ago Marie and I got the chance to see him live. He performed at the Royal Oak Music Theatre. It wasn't exactly a sold out show. Maybe that's why we haven't seen him return. But it was early-ish in his career, so...
90% black crowd. My face HURT from laughing so hard. I was in pain. The dude was hilarious.
Pickle told me about this 90 minute video streaming on Netflix. Do yourself a favor and stream this shit. Lavell is king.
The sun went down and I grabbed Marie to watch it with me for her first time. I've seen it a bunch of times and love it. I pick up new details each time. More dialogue, more nuances.
I think the acting is even better than I remembered, too. Subtle and convincing.
The air of conspiracy is harrowing. The pagan gods vs Christian god is interesting. The film does a good job at holding up a mirror to the absurdities of all religions, pantheistic as well as monotheistic. It's truly a great horror film. No monsters. No blood. Just the most evil creature of all...mankind. Mankind and superstitions. Fuckin a. A nightmarish combination if ever there was one.
The way the film is told through music is actually pretty cool. It's only as campy as you let it be. If you absorb yourself in Summerisle...it's just part of the story. Part of the village. It's an interesting storytelling technique to employ for a horror film especially.
Marie was digging it until the final chapter. The actual wicker man sacrifice. Just too grounded in reality for her these days. Torture and religious persecution and whatnot. It's pretty grim. Very well acted, though.
I still love it. The Wicker Man is a very unique, haunting, horror film. Just how I like em.
How he didn't succumb to her seduction is beyond me.
Eyes Wide Shut and the Wicker Man: creepy masks, creepy films.
