#159 - Red Beard

Yes, I finally got around to the incredibly rich and awesome Red Beard! - (And the first post of 2024 - yeesh) -  I started it once, dozed off, and realized it wasn't holding my interest, so I gave things a rest and came back.

This is Kurosawa and Mifune's final collaboration.   Kurosawa took over 2 years to make it, blew a ton of money on an ultra realistic set that was almost never used, and had legit props in drawers that were never opened.   I suppose one could make the case that the extravagance and length of time it took to do this film is what hampered his future opportunities, but in any case, he had a magnificent run that started to wrap up here.

The film is set in 19th century Edo (Tokyo) and centers around a young up and coming doctor who finds himself assigned to a public clinic that covers the impoverished.   Over the course of 3 hrs, we learn more about his story, the stories of some of the patients, and the workers at the clinic.   We see his gradual transformation from a disgruntled doctor to a legitimate healer.   It feels a bit like a trope but in Kurosawa's hands, it's a masterful story.

It IS 3 hours, and doesn't get nearly as much action as some of the other films we've seen.   But it is one of his finest movies, his last in Black and White, and his last in the anamorphic widescreen 2:35 to 1 ratio.   It will take him years to make his next film, and from here on out it will be a bit of a struggle to get funding for his projects.   It's a bit sad to think of this as his last "great" film with Mifune, but there are other great films to come (7 more to be exact) and we'll get to some of them soon.

I may watch this again with the Audio Commentary in the background - I found myself very interested in what was going on behind the scenes on this film that took so long they actually did tours of the set some days with people on buses.

All and all a real excellent piece.

Side Tangent - Godzilla Minus One

 

I've been a tiny bit stalled on Red Beard due to it's length and my ADHD - someday soon I'll get it done.

IN THE MEANTIME, I've made a trip to a real theater again for the first time in a few week.   I've probably seen about 20 Godzilla movies from both Japan and America, and as far as a genre goes, I like them.  This one right here is probably the best one I've ever seen, hands down.

Long story short, it's another "reboot" which means it starts like there's never been a Godzilla before.  (This gets complicated - but basically, most movies are sequels of the 1954, or there were a couple stretches where they were sequels to each other, but by and large, until 2016's Shin Godzilla, all the Toho properties basically assumed Godzilla's first film exists and builds on that)

But what makes this unique is that this one takes place in the years right after World War II, in the late 40's.   The characters we meet in this movie are already struggling with PTSD, Trauma, and Survivor's Guilt before even getting to the monster.   They're living in burned out buildings in Tokyo, barely surviving, and working to do things like clean up mines after the war.   When Godzilla shows up they are already on the precipice.

I saw something on Reddit that really hit true with me - in this one you are rooting for Godzilla to be defeated.   In a lot of these, you root for Godzilla vs. another Monster or hope to see him back someday.  However, in this one, you grow attached to the characters, and that doesn't leave you.   There are moments where the theater is silent as a pindrop - it's really something to experience.

In any case, I think it's the best Godzilla movie I have ever seen, and it's worth a trip to the big screen one time if you can pull it off

RB

#158 - The Importance of Being Earnest

 yeah....this didn't do much for me - Not a big Oscar Wilde fan.   Honestly struggled to keep my attention with it and any attempt to write much up for it here is just filling space - I watched it - let's move on

#157 - The Royal Tenenbaums

 

#157 is our second Wes Anderson film and one of his most popular ones with a stellar cast.   There is such a unique style to his films.   I recently saw Asteroid City, so to compare these two films which are 20 years apart you still see the same oddities and framing and almost a storybook set.   

This is basically a family drama with a lot of oddballs.   To say more probably wouldn't do service so I'll hold up at that - my biggest issue with getting this done was finding a place to watch it since it's currently not on the Channel.

The only thing that I didn't like was that I guess Gene Hackman made it kind of hard on the Director.   He was hoping for fun and light roles to wrap up his career, and I guess he was berating Wes hard enough that Bill Murray (who has been in a number of his films) showed up on his days off to keep an eye on things.  Alternate fun fact, Bill was supposed to be in Asteroid City, but I guess he got sick and they had to sub with Steve Carell, which is fine too.

Anyways, it's a pretty good film from a creative director with a unique style.   I can't say enough how much I like that whether in music, film, singing, or whatever.   Someone who is able to do something no one else does or create what no one else thinks to create is always a winner in my book.   The first thought I had was oddly, Yasujiro Ozu, who has that unique way of filming with the characters speaking directly to your face.    No one else does what these directors do and apparently Ozu inspired Wes Anderson, so there you go.

See that was only a few weeks - not a year between entries :)

#156 - Hearts and Minds

 

So I liked this one but not as much as I thought I would.   It's a classic 1974 documentary (mostly argued anti-war documentary) on the Vietnam War.   He does a good job of getting his subjects.   He spends a lot of time stateside on the "rah-rah" crowd that encourages all good boys do their duty.

He spends a lot of time also communicating with the Vietnamese who make it plain at this point that some want the Americans there but most don't.  One of the interviews that struck me was of an entrepreneur preparing for peace, the massive influx of capitalism and tourists, and prosperity.    This is all done between the time the Americans are winding down, but before North Vietnam steamrolls them in '75.   One has to see this footage and immediately wonder if this guy made it out or not.   Maybe the Director's Commentary has something.

Because of the time of filming and the US commitment wrapping down, it's hard to get a full grasp if they knew what was coming or what the final results would be.   I suppose this would hit much harder in 1974, with the anti-war movement still going on, but the full self-reflection hadn't happened yet.   Other documentaries, (thinking of the excellent Ken Burns series) would do a much better job of showing the whole picture and both sides more fairly, but if you hadn't had any anti-Vietnam documentaries out yet, then this one would be pretty incredible.

As it was, I liked it.   I didn't love it but I might watch the special features on the Criterion Channel.

Also, side note - in a stupid, stupid move that makes no sense to me, Wikipedia pulled it's list of movies in the Collection that I have used for years - LOL.   I think it went away a week ago but the last archived copy on Archive.org is golden

List of Criterion Collection releases - Wikipedia

#155 - Tokyo Olympiad

 

It seemed like this one was hard to find for a while - in fact, at one point back in the Filmstruck days I was going to blitz thru 30 movies more or less to get to it before the channel shut down - that would have left us at a very different spot today.   I'd probably be up to 300 by now.

But what we have here is a great film - a triumph of sports, and really a study on the the spirit of athleticism.   I guess this isn't what Japan wanted.   In fact there's alternate edits and Japanese takes on the Olympics precisely because they didn't like Kon's vision here.   In the special features I learned some of his negative was taken and re-cut for an alternate film commissioned by Japan.   The restoration team ended up restoring both films, stating it wasn't their place to make the political or artistic choices.   I guess we do lose the stereo soundtrack in this cut, but all the stereo prints were destroyed at one time or another.

What is left is a vision.  and what is that vision?   It seems to be an exploration of the athletes more than the events.   Quite often we see zoomed in faces before the events, as he is analyzing the strain and stresses on these athletes before they launch the shot putt, or do the 100m dash.   He wants to show their agony before and after the competition, and of course, the triumph of victory.

I often found myself watching an event, getting the final time, and then going to Google to see what the world record was.   Some were set during these Olympics but they would be broken in later years.  Still it's a crazy thing to see in some like the 100m dash, we're taking 4/10th's of a second is all.   Here's some side trivia - the winner, Bob Hayes of USA, would go on to play pro football, and is the only Athlete to have both a gold medal and a Super Bowl Ring.   There was also manual and automatic timing going on and so his actual time is between 10.06 and 9.99 seconds depending on manual, automatic, or whatever you use.   In any case he was thought to be the fastest sprinter in the world before Usain Bolt.

I ended up liking this a lot more than I thought I would and I'm pretty sure it's got to do with the way Kon chose what he edited to see it in a different light than the typical competition films.   I always joked that if I kept doing this for 20 years I'd eventually hit the Olympic box set and then I'd call it quits but hey....maybe I'll keep going after that 

RB

#154 - The Horse's Mouth

This was an interesting little film with Alec Guinness, who would write the screenplay for this film based upon a famous novel in the 40's.   Basically this is the comedic life of an eccentric painter, and the somewhat humorous escapades that surround him as he attempts to get some of his old paintings back, get new ones done, and tries very hard to not get arrested.   

Obviously any Star Wars fan will recognize Alec who by this point has white hair and the same mop top.  The voice is a bit different, but the gruff character does seem to draw you in a bit.   I admit this didn't hold my attention as much as I wanted it to but at the end of the day it was an interesting film.

This will be the first of three entries in the collection by the director Robert Neame.   (The second one is just up ahead in #163)   He directed and worked in quite a large number of films but none of their titles stand out to me although I'm sure to a British Cinema fan they would.   In any case, we have some very interesting and fascinating works ahead so I'm glad to have seen this one