Classic Cinema Discussion

[GhostMachine]

3 hours ago, Your Mom said:

It's been way too long but tonight I watched Network! It's really wild how much this movie predicted about how TV would evolve mostly for the worse. Why the hell did Faye Dunaway want to sleep with that old dude though?  I couldn't get past that. Movie took a really crazy turn that I wasn't expecting either but it's one I could see real life mirroring someday  

 

 

 

Classics watched this year:

1. 12 Angry Men (1957)
2. The Maltese Falcon
3. The Third Man
4. The Searchers
5. Network

Yes, but...the one question I have for you:

Spoiler

Are you mad as hell, and not going to take this any more?

 

[Your Mom]

I don't know if you guys knew this but Casablanca is a really good movie! My favorite old timey actor Peter Lorre was in it too! I may not have gotten into it as much because I already knew the ending but I really enjoyed a lot of the performances. I want to see more Bogart stuff and thought Ingrid Bergman and Claude Rains were really good too. It was cool getting the context behind the classic lines I would always hear and not really know where they came from.

Classics watched this year:

1. 12 Angry Men (1957)
2. The Maltese Falcon
3. The Third Man
4. The Searchers
5. Network
6. Casablanca 

[Lint]

@Your Mom have you checked out The Music Man?  One of my favorite musicals, saw it when I was a kid and its still a fav.

Of course, it was made in 1957, and was based in, I think, 1913, so its treatment and opinion of women is definitely a "of its time" thing.  For example, one of the songs says a girl who kisses on the very first date "is usually a hussy".

But its a great movie, even got a full Simpsons episode that is a reference to it

[Liam]

On 23/01/2023 at 16:22, Mx. Canadian Destroyer said:

I am doing the Criterion Challenge this year. Have watched three movies so far.

Random Number Generator Selected - Onibaba (1964) - This was amazing. Two women living in a swamp who trap and kill soldiers leaving a civil war to make money. Things go awry when one of the women's son-in-law returns. 

I watched Onibaba earlier this year and absolutely loved it. Easy film to watch, very engaging and dark in tone.

I'm trying to watch more films (classics especially), so watched 'Cleo de 5 a 7', which was good but wasn't necessarily a film that I'd place as highly as some do. I think maybe it was one of those films that was particularly novel at the time and I perhaps don't have the context to understand it at that level.

Not as classic, but I also watched 'Dogtooth' and 'Fat Girl/A ma souer' - both really good, dark films to watch. Dogtooth in particular was excellent, if deranged.

[TheGrandAvatar]

@Your Momis The Big Sleep with Bogart and Baccall next on the watch list? You'll probably enjoy it.

Had a lot more questions than answers with the plot in that one. Although it did get me into the work of Raymond Chandler the author of the novel it is based on.

The performances, and filming are what make it really stand out. So yeah the story is not the best, it's the settings and performance that are the true beauty about it all. Bogart and Baccall are electric chemistry in the gritty setting of Chandler's Private Eye Phillip Marlowe. They went on to marry, and star in a further two film's together. Key Largo is the one that I can remember being the better out of their return to starring together. 

Have you thought of checking Bogart in his earlier work with James Cagney?! The Pre Code films always go the same way with them both, due to how it had to be back then with the person usually getting what is coming them.  But it's interesting to check out Bogart earlier in his career in these, and appreciate the art and acting of him and Cagney. The Roaring Twenties and Angels With Dirty Faces are the two they appear in. 

Shockingly I'm surprised Cagney survived filming those movies with the live bullets and stories of near misses with gun work on those early shoots. 

I love a lot of old back and white films. Sadly. I don't think a lot of them would be considered classic. Ed Wood does spring to mind on some of the many interests I have. Plus the B Movies that they might be considered. Along with Universal Horror to Hammer Horror/Amicus. Most of the fun I have thought is researching into them.

Often enjoy the 30s to 60s Black and White films filmed and set in England. There's often a few gems I've come across. Tread Softly Stranger, Man In The Attic, The 39 Steps, The Night Has Eyes and Brighton Rock. 

[Liam]

Watched 'The Magnificent Ambersons' last night. A really good film, if a little underwhelming in terms of the ending. However, the opening twenty or so minutes or so that pretty much set up the rest of the story is excellent - you get this sweeping summary of a family and their legacy, with quite a few moving parts but little wasted motion in setting up the main character in particular.

[Hobo]

1 hour ago, Liam said:

Watched 'The Magnificent Ambersons' last night. A really good film, if a little underwhelming in terms of the ending.

Orson Welles would have had much stronger words about it

[Liam]

3 hours ago, Hobo said:

Orson Welles would have had much stronger words about it

So I gather. I did a little bit of general digging after watching it last night, but didn't read up what the actual ending was supposed to be?

[GhostMachine]

On 01/05/2023 at 06:50, Liam said:

So I gather. I did a little bit of general digging after watching it last night, but didn't read up what the actual ending was supposed to be?

The studio took control of the editing and ignored Welles' notes, cutting around an hour of film out and shooting a happier ending. The negatives of the unused footage was later destroyed, so a properly edited version to match Welles' vision couldn't be made later on. But the twist is that the released film uses the same ending as the novel it was based on. 

My guess is that Welles' ending left out Lucy and Eugene reconciling with George.

[Hobo]

Its also worth noting that Welles was in Brazil shooting a documentary when the ending was reshot without him.

[Skummy]

Also that not completing a film and leaving the studio to cobble something else together, often because he was either over-stretched or had got bored and moved on to the next thing, was pretty much the pattern for Welles' entire career. 

Mr. Arkadin had about six or seven different versions on the market because it was edited without him, The Lady From Shanghai was largely edited and cut without his involvement, as was Touch of Evil. Most of his Shakespeare films were either shot in a handful of days, or over a period of years because the money kept running out. That's before you get into all the truly unfinished, unreleased, and often probably never even meaningfully started film projects he'd talk about.

To make matters worse, he was a complete bullshit artist of the most brilliant kind. You can't believe a single story he ever told, he contradicted himself constantly, and whatever version of a story he gave depended entirely on whoever he was telling it to. 

[Your Mom]

Ok I tried to do something a little different tonight. I've not seen much of his work so I figured it was time for a double feature starring the legendary Mr. Sidney Poitier! Then Pluto TV decided to be an asshole and cut my double feature in half to a...single feature. Anyway

In the Heat of the Night was amazing and really showed me why people think so highly of Sidney. Not going to go through the whole thing I'm sure most of you know it but when Sidney backhanded rich white dude I pumped my fist. He was a damn good detective and he didn't let these racist assholes take away his dignity. "They call me Mr. Tibbs!"

The Defiant Ones well I mean the first ten minutes seemed promising enough before the kind folks at Pluto TV told me it was no longer available  I may be a little ahead of myself with it but both those guys seemed like violent criminals and the movie seemed to be setting me up to cheer for them? Like why would I do that? I think I'll get back to it when I get an opportunity though. However until then I withhold judgement.

 

Classics watched this year:

1. 12 Angry Men (1957)
2. The Maltese Falcon
3. The Third Man
4. The Searchers
5. Network
6. Casablanca 
7. In the Heat of the Night

[DFF]

On 14/05/2023 at 03:18, Your Mom said:

Ok I tried to do something a little different tonight. I've not seen much of his work so I figured it was time for a double feature starring the legendary Mr. Sidney Poitier! Then Pluto TV decided to be an asshole and cut my double feature in half to a...single feature. Anyway

In the Heat of the Night was amazing and really showed me why people think so highly of Sidney. Not going to go through the whole thing I'm sure most of you know it but when Sidney backhanded rich white dude I pumped my fist. He was a damn good detective and he didn't let these racist assholes take away his dignity. "They call me Mr. Tibbs!"

The Defiant Ones well I mean the first ten minutes seemed promising enough before the kind folks at Pluto TV told me it was no longer available  I may be a little ahead of myself with it but both those guys seemed like violent criminals and the movie seemed to be setting me up to cheer for them? Like why would I do that? I think I'll get back to it when I get an opportunity though. However until then I withhold judgement.

 

Classics watched this year:

1. 12 Angry Men (1957)
2. The Maltese Falcon
3. The Third Man
4. The Searchers
5. Network
6. Casablanca 
7. In the Heat of the Night

If you want another classic Poitier film, I can recommend Guess Who's Coming To Dinner. Also has Spencer Tracey (in his final role iirc) and Katharine Hepburn. It's a racially charged rom-com-dram. 

[Benji]

Somehow I've never watched 12 Angry Men despite it absolutely being up my alley, so tonight on a whim I threw it on. Just a phenomenal piece of film making that holds up just as well in 2023 as I'm sure it did in 1957.

Spoiler

Obvious connections to politico-social commentaries aside (and that's a huge aside considering how well it deals with that), the bit at the end where Juror #3 tears up the picture, and all the frustration you've felt with this man just melts away when you realise how upset he is at what he just did, and how close he may just have been to condemning a young man who may just as well have been his own son. You spend the film knowing that he's using it as a proxy, but the moment he realises his folly all you want to do is hug him.

Every single juror plays their role so well, just an absolutely stellar example of acting, scripting, and film-making in general coming together to create something even greater than the sum of its parts.

 

[Hobo]

On 15/05/2023 at 22:56, Benji said:

Somehow I've never watched 12 Angry Men despite it absolutely being up my alley, so tonight on a whim I threw it on. Just a phenomenal piece of film making that holds up just as well in 2023 as I'm sure it did in 1957.

  Hide contents

Obvious connections to politico-social commentaries aside (and that's a huge aside considering how well it deals with that), the bit at the end where Juror #3 tears up the picture, and all the frustration you've felt with this man just melts away when you realise how upset he is at what he just did, and how close he may just have been to condemning a young man who may just as well have been his own son. You spend the film knowing that he's using it as a proxy, but the moment he realises his folly all you want to do is hug him.

Every single juror plays their role so well, just an absolutely stellar example of acting, scripting, and film-making in general coming together to create something even greater than the sum of its parts.

 

I don't think I've seen the original but I have seen William Friedkin's 1997 made for tv movie version that features Edward James Olmos, Jack Lemmon, Tony Danza, James Gandolfini, Ossie Davis and George C Scott.

[Your Mom]

I admit this endeavor has been going a little slower than I would like but I'm back on it today. I was feeling a little patriotic so I watched Mr. Smith Goes to Washington! This might be one of the oldest movies I've ever seen but it was actually pretty great. I wasn't feeling it for almost the first hour though. Smith was just a little too "Oh golly wow I'm so naive!" for me. It was like Jimmy Stewart was playing a 12 year old. But once he realized what was going on and started to fight back it turned into a really great film. My favorite character was actually Saunders his assistant. I love in these old movies where they actually let women be competent and she is basically the one that gets things done not Smith.

The movie ended kind of abruptly though. Like it kinda reminded me of a wrestling show where they managed the timing really poorly and oh shit we have to wrap up this story and be off the air in two minutes! 😮 But even with that I'd still recommend this one to the few of you who haven't seen it.

 

 

Classics watched this year:

1. 12 Angry Men (1957)
2. The Maltese Falcon
3. The Third Man
4. The Searchers
5. Network
6. Casablanca 
7. In the Heat of the Night
8. Mr. Smith Goes to Washington

[GhostMachine]

Its not one of my top 5 favorite Jimmy Stewart performances, but still a great film.

When you get a chance, consider watching Rope. its Jimmy Stewart in Alfred Hitchcock's first Technicolor movie, takes place in real time, and is (non-spoiler) quite daring for its time. Its based on a play from the late 1920's. Stewart did 4 Hitchcock movies in total. The others being Rear Window, The Man Who Knew Too Much, and Vertigo. Rope and Rear Window are my two favorites.

A few recommendations for classic movies, off the top of my head:

Mr. Blandings Builds His Dream House (Cary Grant, Myrna Loy)

Double Indemnity (Fred MacMurray, Barbara Stanwick)

It Happened One Night (Clark Gable, Claudette Colbert)

Sullivan's Travels (Joel McCrea, Veronica Lake)

Stalag 17 (William Holden, Otto Preminger, Peter Graves, Neville Brand, etc) - Warning: You'll never look at Hogan's Heroes the same way again after watching. 

 

 

[DFF]

I second the recommendations for Rope and Double Indemnity (the latter is an ALL TIME great imo). 

[gunnar hendershow]

On 06/07/2023 at 06:04, DFF said:

I second the recommendations for Rope and Double Indemnity (the latter is an ALL TIME great imo). 

Barbara Stanwyck's Phyllis Dietrichson is the femme fatale by which all femmes fatale are judged.

[Your Mom]

Ok when I first decided to do this there was a rather large Elephant in the room and Srar don't like Elephants in her room! These are my thoughts on Citizen Kane!

The scope of the thing for the time period is incredibly impressive! Some of the shots they pull off would still be impressive today. Like I don't tend to notice that kind of stuff but it's just beautifully shot I can't imagine how they did it. A weird observation but when he made that flex about being able to lose a million dollars a year on the paper and still not have to go out of business for 60 years that still would have made him bankrupt in the 80's. Time is strange  

But the real question is did I like it?

No not really. It was dreary and incredibly depressing and not entertaining in the slightest to me.

Did I enjoy watching it?

No not really. See the last question for the reasons why. I very much felt like I was just watching it to check a box off my list. I wasn't looking forward to it when I started this idea and nothing that happened changed my mind.

Is it the greatest movie ever made?

I feel like that's subjective but in my mind fuck no. Even if I was just ranking it on it's own merits and not how much I enjoyed it I don't understand how it's anything but like the lower half of a top 25.

So that was kinda weird. The supposed "best movie ever" is my least favorite of the admittedly short list so far. I think the next one is going to be something I'm interested in and not just checking a box but at least I can say I've seen it and now I don't have to see it again.

Classics watched this year:

1. 12 Angry Men (1957)
2. The Maltese Falcon
3. The Third Man
4. The Searchers
5. Network
6. Casablanca 
7. In the Heat of the Night
8. Mr. Smith Goes to Washington
9. Citizen Kane