# 46 - The Most Dangerous Game

Usually the first thing I do is look at the next film and see how long it is and the general plot - when I saw this one was 63 minutes I decided - "eh, fuck it" and just cranked it out

Probably me and about 200 million teenagers have read this story in Middle/High School - I remember reading it years ago.  This was a film adaptation done about 8 years (?) after it was published?

Most of the names/directors/actors escape me but of course, Fay Wray as the damsel - (added for Hollywood's sake, not in the original book) - we all know from King Kong as well as the chap playing her brother, and there's a reason for that

When I first started watching this I was struck by how Fay Wray was once again running around in a jungle just like King Kong's - and I THOUGHT in my head there was some distance between these two films but in fact, they were shot at the same time - with one of the same directors, written by one of the same screenwriters, and used some of the same sets and three of the actors from King Kong - LOL

Designed originally to be a bigger production, cost cutting and issues at RKO took it down to this deeply condensed 63 minute time frame with some fast pacing and cost cutting measures.  I listened to the Bruce Eder commentary - (I was curious and hey, it was only an extra hour - LOL) - and he stated the actual timelines for the two films shooting are kinda muddled - there's a good chance that a lot of Brian Armstrong and Fay Wray scenes, for instance, were shot during the long gap in special effects that were done after they shot some of their Kong scenes. 

The film lapsed into the public domain, but you'll want to get the good copy from Criterion with the commentary if you watch it - not that colorized shit. 

I thought of it initially as a suspense film but they're calling it a horror flick which I understand - some other interesting commentary in here about how some wardrobes/lines wouldn't have been allowed 18 months later after some movie censorship codes came in - but dat's life - I didn't walk away with the hots for Fay or anything - LOL

OK - now I gotta do some work - but then again...the next film is only 90 minutes too...hmmm

# 45 - Taste of Cherry

wife is out of town for a few days - expecting to get a few backlogged features in

This is a film I've never heard of by a director I've never heard of and may be the first film I've ever seen from Iran - in fact I'm pretty sure it is.

An interesting work by Abbas Kiarostami, it follows a man driving around on the outskirts of Tehran looking for someone to bury him after he kills himself - it took me a little while to get to this cause it, well, was a tiny bit boring for me - but I got thru it the next day - I guess Roger Ebert hated it

It was an ok film - it won the Palme D'Or at the Cannes Film Festival which is no slouch.   (Some of my favorite winners are Kagemusha, The Wind that Shakes the Barley, and Farewell, my Concubine) - but it's presentation - primarily long dialogues shot from the alternate seat of a two seater, didn't leave a lot for me - there was also some interesting audio work done on here - my cats were very attentive to the sounds of some interesting birds/wildlife in Tehran - LOL

But not one I'd probably watch again in the future - there's a director's interview as a special feature - it was ok to me

#44 - The Red Shoes

Happy 2018! - took a few weeks to get to this - I sorta went down a rabbit hole with the Antoine Doinel movies - (#185-188) but we'll get to those...probably in a few years - LOL

The Red Shoes is one I've never heard of - a nice little colorized movie a couple years after WWII following a ballet dancer who is doing a production of a Hans Christen Andersen story about - wait for it - The Red Shoes.

Watching this movie, I was reminded of a very contemporary film - Miles Teller and J.K. Simmons in Whiplash - this film has the protege and the teacher and both stories have something to say about the price of art - especially excellence and what it does to a person's soul, their relationships, and the student/teacher dynamic.  Both movies are cautionary tales about not sucking so much marrow out of art you lose what gives life meaning.

This MAY be the first film even closely resembling Ballet and the backstage life that I've ever seen.   I'm sure there are some characters here who will be familiar to most backstage folks - it's an international cast, and takes place a big chunk down in the South of France.   The visuals and music are excellent, and the middle of the movie is punctuated by a central performance of the title ballet, with some excellent camera effects and stretching of the boundary between camera and stage as sometimes you are with the audience watching the stage and other times you are the world they are trying to manufacture.

This would be worth a second viewing with the commentary track, and while I only had one special feature on Filmstruck, it involved the restoration process, which if you've read this blog, you know is one of those things I really like.   The oddness of this one, involving three separate negatives, has to be seen to be appreciated - This restoration in particular came out fantastic.

Great Movie - a combination of a musical, a dance ballet, and drama - but with some sad foreshadowing of the story to come. 

#43 - Lord of the Flies

Here we go - a proper homicidal mob sorta movie

Like most people, I first read this book probably in middle or High School - the movie here is a pretty faithful rendition of the book - done by Director Peter Brook - it retains English roots, although I believe it's made by an American, and with very few exceptions or cut scenes, doesn't deviate from the source material except maybe at the very beginning.

Right off the bat I was reminded of "Night Of the Living Dead" - the opening reminds me of Night's closing, and some of the violent mob scenes in the latter half of the film remind me of the Living Dead - (side note - guess what's being released in a couple months on Criterion!) - It's a great film about the collapse of society and morals in a closed ecosystem - perhaps it loses some of it's teeth when reading it at a young age because I don't remember it hitting me like the story did this time at an older age but maybe that's the movie

Some really good use of music here - (which according to the special features was done in 5 hours) - Two melodies are dominant - one is a Choral piece sung and played at times when you get the impression that law and order are established, and some spooky stuff played when the tribe descends into the frenzy and madness around the campfire.

They really did a good job here of making these kids terrifying in the 2nd half of the film, and of course, by the end of the film their clothes are practically falling apart - There are a lot of special features and extras to this one, including a deleted scene, some scrapbooks of stuff that was shot and home video shot by the kids - (apparently to keep them busy - LOL) - it's a nice collection and if you like the movie, there's a great audio commentary as well by the director and producer.

It's a pretty good story and I liked this version a lot - I think I saw the 1990 version years ago but in my head this one feels superior - but who can say - either way, it's a classic and almost an art piece in the way it was presented and the story that was told - very good stuff

#42 - Fishing With John

I literally banged out these 6 episodes of an IFC/Bravo show at work tonight - a comedic take on fishing shows, featuring John and some celebrities he knows

The fishing is the background to put these characters together.   As a whole it works ok but there's definitely a better vibe between John and his friends William Dafoe and Dennis Hopper then there was with moody actors and directors

Not quite sure how this ended up in the collection but it's weird enough to justify being released SOMEWHERE - I won't lie - I watched some of it while doing other stuff - it's not shot on super high grade film, so it worked fine on the Ipad

special features include commentary from John - that may be more funny than the other stuff - it's fine for a couple hours though.

RB

Side Tangent - Musings on Star Wars

Since the last entry sucked SUCH dog balls....freaking Shakespeare - I figured with a week to go I'd do some writing in here about Star Wars

Star Wars is literally the first movie I can ever remember wanting to see at 5 years old - and here's what happened - in my 5 year old broken kid English - (hell,  not even 5 yet) - I said I wanted to see Star Wars

My mom asked why but in the end she took me to the drive-in and we watched it - except...I was pretty sure it wasn't Star Wars - in fact, my primitive reading skills soon confirmed we were watching A Star is Born

I still tease my mom about that - two years later i saw it on the re-release and it's amazing how much of the larger context of Empire and Rebels I didn't get but I got the core of Good Guys Vs. Bad - I don't think we ever played Cowboys and Indians - we played Stormtroopers and Han Solo's/Luke Skywalker's - Look - Luke wasn't as cool after the first one - so Han was generally who we played - but Luke GOT cooler

I didn't hate the prequels - in fact, I sorta liked them as much as the originals because I had backstory - info, I understood the context better - I had read comics and books - and for all the Jar Jar Binks shit, I liked them - I got uber excited for every Trailer - same with Episode 7

Except Episode 7 wasn't the same - it wasn't as good for me - partially because the context of the New Order and a Resistance didn't make any sense to me - (I have been told I'm not the only one to go WTF) - and the rehash of the original Trilogy plot - another planet killer - Han playing more like a cartoon hero than a scoundrel - I could have used a lot more of the moments between him and Leia when he was leaving. 

Rogue One was a return to form for me - and I'm starting to enjoy these blaster bolts that don't just drop a guy but hurl him across the room

In March of this year, my wife and I went on vacation to the far SW point of Ireland - Mizen Head - where no one was going cause it wasn't vacation season yet, but when you were living in Minnesota, Ireland is fine in March - at the nearly empty tourism office, the lady said we should go to Brow Head - (next Peninsula over) and that they had shot some of the new Star Wars there - I knew that Skellig Michael a hundred miles away was where they shot the ending so I was confused, but I understood later that this was Ep 8 that shot there - and most of the scenes I've seen in the trailer were shot on a cliff right there near some farmer's land most likely

I still get excited and I'm excited for this one - I'm hoping it feels more like a movie and less like an ADHD Director's therapy - because at the end of the day, Star Wars is my favorite film franchise and always will be, I suspect.  It almost makes me sad to think they may still be making movies in that Galaxy Far Far away after I'm dead and gone - but here's to Rey, Finn, and all the others trying to capture it for us - I wish it had been George Lucas' vision, but I'll take what I can get.

RB

#41 - Henry V

I WISH I could say I have been taking a while because I had stuff to do - but the truth is, I just hate Shakespeare - I literally fell asleep 5 times watching this movie and finally tried watching it DURING work on the Ipad just to finish it

There's some cool stuff here - the story starts on a stage a'la Globe Theatre and then moves out to some sets, and finally to the battlefield before closing back on a stage again - it was made during WWII, and no doubt the themes of unity between France and Britain were intentionally chosen for this story - the acting is fine - I just really hate Shakespeare - and that's kind of the high and low of it - maybe I'd like Kenneth Branagh's version better but even then I practically needed the subtitles to get 1/2 of what was going on

Anyways, this one is done - nothing to say but ugh and I'm glad it's over - I'm sure for 1944 it was the bee's knees but it just left me blah today