Old Movies - Not new movies.

It’s about monster movies, and some teens interested in each other, with the Cuban missile crisis as a backdrop.

Most reviews seemed to love it, but I didn’t. And I mean contemporary reviews, where they surely don’t remember 1962 any more than I do, so it’s not nostalgia for the stuff of childhood.

Some mention that the movie-within-a-movie is the best part, and I absolutely agree, although to be fair putting together an entertaining 10–15 minutes is easier than an entertaining hour and a half.

What bothered me the most was the relationships. They weren’t played satirically that I could see, other than that there was a criminal-slash-beat-poet type as the older bad boy villain. Kellie Martin’s still into the villain and he’s still into her, but for whatever reason she also takes on Omri Katz, who’s not playing a type that she’d want. His character is kind of nervous with the novelty of her. And the central character gets involved with a girl who might be as close in height to his much younger brother as to him. She just looks so young like maybe she is old enough to have a crush on a boy, but would he be interested back?

And the villain threatening and attacking Omri Katz reminds me of being bullied growing up.

I kind of liked Cathy Moriarty. I’ve never seen anything else she was in.

Yes, John Goodman is watchable, but I don’t find that character all that hugely appealing.

Oh, and the music behind it all. So Hollywood awful. Reminded me of Spielberg movies when I was a kid.

I did see something mention that the ending shot could be a suggestion of how Vietnam was just over the horizon for these kids. That’s interestingly dark.

I remember an indian man, elephants, it was in english, comedy.

Really wish i could remember, it was a really good movie.

Tom Schiller film with a strong SNL connection. Never really properly released. Today known as a more or less lost film that has Bill Murray. I was curious about it because it was obscure and because I had been looking for the Schiller shorts from the early SNL days that had Belushi, Radner, etc.

Zach Galligan plays it so blankly; maybe he was told to.

It’s all a love letter to the golden era of Hollywood, but I don’t like the golden era at all, so this was a real slog for me. It’s odd, but not nearly as interestingly odd as Guy Maddin.

From reading articles online, I began to get the feeling that the whole film was just a studio trying to get out of a contract they’d made with Lorne Michaels as cheaply as possible.

I’ve meant to see this for a few years. The English Wikipedia article says “anti-melodramatic” and “unsensationalistic”, which is very appealing.

I didn’t think it would matter that I know only a few very basic facts about Van Gogh, but in seeing it, it seemed there was a lot you were supposed to recognize. And with events, not knowing whether they happened or whether Pialat was inventing, often left me not knowing what to think about them.

Thoughts, in order

• It must be a pain in the ass to get all that period stuff for a film set in like 1870 or whenever.
• Everyone at this new place is integrating him into things (whether he wants it or not). Is France 150 years ago a warmer place than anywhere I’ve known?
• Why is this girl so into this old guy? Life doesn’t seem that slow and boring for her that I would buy this. Was this in particular a real event at all, or was Pialat just liking the idea that of course pretty young girls want old guys in the arts? I did see one other Pialat movie some years ago, which was about a girl and her dalliances and how she didn’t really love anyone except her daddy, who so-coincidentally was played by Pialat himself.
• The man playing Van Gogh was rather still compared to everyone else, in the way that a non-actor would be. Apparently this guy did some acting but was mostly a singer.
• The girl was a bit inexperienced compared to the rest, and this came out in emotional scenes where there wasn’t quite enough body language sometimes.
• Around the two-hour mark, they and Theo hang out way too long in a brothel. I suppose you’re supposed to be engrossed by the polygon of Van Gogh and Theo and the girl and the prostitute Van Gogh has long had a thing with. The girl trying to not care, etc. But you are two hours in at this point.
• I did like that, in the last minutes, life was resuming for everyone else. Because that is what happens. Even though it is hard to believe that the world will continue without our selves.

I’m not being very positive in this, I know, but I still appreciate the existence of anything anti-melodramatic and unsensationalistic.

A cabal of American industrialists, all fifth-columnists intent on sabotaging the war effort, are methodically murdered by Monsieur Colomb. (Bela Lugosi) Detective Dick Martin (Clayton Moore) is assigned to uncover this his fiendish plot. (Clayton Moore is most famous for playing The Lone Ranger!)

This was rushed into production immediately following the attack on Pearl Harbor by Japanese sources, making it one of the first movies to respond to the attack and the United States new enemies.

One of the flop Saturday Night Live movies based on one-note characters stretched out to feature length.

When it was trying to be serious about psychological health, it was relatively all right, but every bit of “comedy” fell so absolutely flat. Al Franken must have wanted to say something genuinely helpful but was limited by the shape of the opportunity at hand. Both needing to be a comedy in general and needing to keep his character as somewhat ridiculous.

Stuart had a family of stereotypical screw-ups. His brother’s role was too broad where he had to be both a beer-drinking football-fan kind of idiot at times and insightful at other times.

Stuart was obviously gay, but they couldn’t really touch the issue in 1995, so he had this female friend who was unrealistically around at all times when you need another person to observe or smile at whatever is happening. Although it mentioned that she was his sponsor in some self-help group, and maybe being a sponsor requires being around all the time.

I made it through an hour before starting to fast forward.

Set in New York City in live television of the 1950s, a show like Sid Caesar’s, an aging alcoholic movie star like Errol Flynn.

In reviews, everyone loves it so much. Maybe they all remembered the fifties. One commented that it would look questionable to today’s audience that the viewpoint character chases an uninterested woman, wears her down, and she finally gives in and then likes him. Yes, it did indeed.

Overall, I suppose it was okay. It did feel like wacky events were presented a little too straight in some way so they would come across to me as unrealistic rather than comedic.

It tries to be touching about the movie star being brave and reconnecting with his daughter, but it didn’t get enough screen time.

A guide leads two men through an area known as the Zone to find a room that grants wishes.

This is one of those movies that invite you into a new language once you see it. Amazing in both its effectiveness and hilarious camp. It almost contains the greatest fist fight scene of all time. But it's not just a movie to be gawked at, It's a movie to be savored.

cross-posted from: https://kbin.social/m/13thFloor/t/457507

"The feeling is definitely there. It's a new morning in America... fresh, vital. The old cynicism is gone. We have faith in our leaders. We're optimistic as to what becomes of it all. It really boils down to our ability to accept. We don't need pessimism. There are no limits."

"Outside the limit of our sight, feeding off us, perched on top of us, from birth to death, are our owners! Our owners! They have us. They control us! They are our masters! Wake up! They're all about you! All around you!"

One of the best everyman's survival guide to dealing with alien infiltration. The Electroids love to use these kind of tactics.

They Live is a 1988 American science fiction action horror film written and directed by John Carpenter, based on the 1963 short story "Eight O'Clock in the Morning" by Ray Nelson. Starring Roddy Piper, Keith David, and Meg Foster, the film follows an unnamed drifter who discovers through special sunglasses that the ruling class are aliens concealing their appearance and manipulating people to consume, breed, and conform to the status quo via subliminal messages in mass media.

Wikipedia

cross-posted from: https://kbin.social/m/13thFloor/t/403415

The Third Man is a 1949 British film noir directed by Carol Reed, written by Graham Greene and starring Joseph Cotten, Alida Valli, Orson Welles, and Trevor Howard. Set in postwar Vienna, the film centres on American Holly Martins (Cotten), who arrives in the city to accept a job with his friend Harry Lime (Welles), only to learn that Lime has died. Viewing his death as suspicious, Martins elects to stay in Vienna and investigate the matter.

The atmospheric use of black-and-white expressionist cinematography by Robert Krasker, with harsh lighting and largely subtle "Dutch angle" camera technique, is a major feature of The Third Man. Combined with the iconic theme music by zither player Anton Karas, seedy locations and acclaimed performances from the cast, the style evokes the atmosphere of an exhausted, cynical post-war Vienna at the start of the Cold War.

Greene wrote the novella of the same name as preparation for the screenplay. Karas's title composition "The Third Man Theme" topped the international music charts in 1950, bringing the previously unknown performer international fame; the theme would also inspire Nino Rota's principal melody in La Dolce Vita (1960).[citation needed] The Third Man is considered one of the greatest films of all time, celebrated for its acting, musical score and atmospheric cinematography.[5]

In 1999, the British Film Institute voted The Third Man the greatest British film of all time. In 2011, a poll of 150 actors, directors, writers, producers and critics for Time Out ranked it the second best British film ever.

Wikipedia

just wanted to share a classic

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/4881141

I'll be watching my yearly staples but would love some new suggestions as well. We could all use a decent dark one as we exit this hellscape of a summer.

My yearly list:

• Hellraiser (1987)
• Psycho (1960)
• The Guest (2014)
• Rosemary's Baby (1968)
• Tucker and Dale vs. Evil (2010)
• Cabin in the Woods (2011)
• It follows (2014)

These are the ones I almost always see over the next two months and I sprinkle in a lot of others from brand new to very old ones. Let's hear yours! (And we can talk about them too!)

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/4859270

The Maltese Falcon is a 1941 American film noir written and directed by John Huston in his directorial debut, based on the 1930 novel of the same name by Dashiell Hammett and indebted to the 1931 movie of the same name. It stars Humphrey Bogart as private investigator Sam Spade and Mary Astor as his femme fatale client. Gladys George, Peter Lorre and Sydney Greenstreet co-star, with the last appearing in his film debut. The story follows a San Francisco private detective and his dealings with three unscrupulous adventurers, all of whom are competing to obtain a jewel-encrusted falcon statuette.

The film premiered in New York City on October 3, 1941, and was nominated for three Academy Awards. Considered one of the greatest films of all time, it was one of the first 25 films selected by the Library of Congress to be included in the National Film Registry for being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant". It is a part of Roger Ebert's series The Great Movies and was cited by Panorama du Film Noir Américain as the first major film noir.

Wikipedia on the film

Free .pdf of the novel by Dashiell Hammet

I know this is the most classic of all, but if you haven't actually seriously watched it. It is a remarkable film in every way.

cross-posted from: https://kbin.social/m/13thFloor/t/343282

Casablanca is a 1942 American romantic drama film directed by Michael Curtiz, and starring Humphrey Bogart, Ingrid Bergman, and Paul Henreid. Filmed and set during World War II, it focuses on an American expatriate (Bogart) who must choose between his love for a woman (Bergman) and helping her husband (Henreid), a Czechoslovak resistance leader, escape from the Vichy-controlled city of Casablanca to continue his fight against the Germans. The screenplay is based on Everybody Comes to Rick's, an unproduced stage play by Murray Burnett and Joan Alison. The supporting cast features Claude Rains, Conrad Veidt, Sydney Greenstreet, Peter Lorre, and Dooley Wilson.

Warner Bros. story editor Irene Diamond convinced producer Hal B. Wallis to purchase the film rights to the play in January 1942. Brothers Julius and Philip G. Epstein were initially assigned to write the script. However, despite studio resistance, they left to work on Frank Capra's Why We Fight series early in 1942. Howard Koch was assigned to the screenplay until the Epsteins returned a month later. Principal photography began on May 25, 1942, ending on August 3; the film was shot entirely at Warner Bros. Studios in Burbank, California, with the exception of one sequence at Van Nuys Airport in Los Angeles.

Although Casablanca was an A-list film with established stars and first-rate writers, no one involved with its production expected it to stand out among the hundreds of pictures produced by Hollywood yearly.[7] Casablanca was rushed into release to take advantage of the publicity from the Allied invasion of North Africa a few weeks earlier.[8] It had its world premiere on November 26, 1942, in New York City and was released nationally in the United States on January 23, 1943. The film was a solid if unspectacular success in its initial run.

Exceeding expectations, Casablanca went on to win the Academy Award for Best Picture, while Curtiz was selected as Best Director and the Epsteins and Koch were honored for Best Adapted Screenplay. Its reputation has gradually grown, to the point that its lead characters,[9] memorable lines,[10] and pervasive theme song[11] have all become iconic, and it consistently ranks near the top of lists of the greatest films in history. In 1989, the United States Library of Congress selected the film as one of the first for preservation in the National Film Registry for being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant".

Wikipedia

Is 25 years old enough? Hope so!

Finally watched this a couple of days ago and wow, it's a ride.

The first act hits differently to how I imagine it did in 1998. At the time neo-nazis were much more fringe than they are now, so the first act took more time than I imagine they would now to humanise the characters a way that allows you to see how they encourage each other into escalating further and further. That said, there were times when it almost felt like the movie was on their side, particularly the triumphant strings during the basketball scene. I think I read at some point that neo nazis watch the 1st act as a celebration of their culture, and it kinda reads that way. It was uncomfortable, but maybe that was the point.

The second act does a good job of showing the process of radicalisation. The young Danny has been totally consumed by the skin head gang, and we see them coaching his speech, berating him for mis-speaking, pulling him away from friends, alienating him from school and sources of guidance.

The last act is satisfying and it wraps up well, but inwont spoil it.

There are some brutal scenes, with one particular moment that I won't spoil, but is infamous. I looked away at the moment it happened but I still saw too much for comfort and the image will stay with me.

A welcome surprise came in the form of Edward Furlong's voice-overs. They took me right back to watching Terminator 2 for the 1000th time when I was 11. His voice overs as John Conner are baked into my subconscious.

All in all, I think the movie is worth a watch, and has some good points and insight. It has some flaws, and I think it might miss the mark at times when viewed from a modern perspective. I suspect these things are mostly a result of the point of time it was made, so with that in mind I do recommend watching it. Just do it on a day when you're feeling thick skinned.

I saw this movie for the first time last year and was really impressed with Ava Gardner acting performance. And of course she got the Oscar that year.

This is a really fun penny dreadful starring Lon Chaney and Joan Crawford. Great visuals and performances.

Thanks for starting this.

I’ll be checking out The Conformist in 4K soon and will leave a review!

Night of the Hunter is without question, one of my favorite movies. When I saw this film for the first time, it opened my eyes to the wealth that can be found in classic cinema. The photography did things I have seen before or since. The imagery is masterful. The performances are intense. There are scenes in this film that are chilling. A visceral film.

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/3151661

Someone mentioned this film in one of our other discussions. I vaguely remember seeing it many years ago, but really couldn't remember many of the details, so I put it on this weekend. Hot damned if it wasn't so much better than I remember. Maybe the world we live in today feels a lot more relevant to the film then when I had seen it before, but I would gladly declare this film a masterpiece of it's time that holds up today. Don't let the newer remake besmirch your perception of this movie. It hits on several levels. Thinking of the context of the film, it is not difficult to see the concern that the auteurs of the time felt over the possibility, or even likelihood of nuclear war. If you haven't seen this one, it's worth your time.

I'd be interested to hear your thoughts on the film.