Multiple Cinegasms

[girl]

haha this is two nights in a row of Chris and Chris getting drunk and talking about '40s actresses.  I'm starting to think I've got a Tyler Durden thing going on.

Woo!

[dieblucasdie]

I agree with cool banana.  I feel so dirty.  Guys.  The DIRT'S NOT COMING OFF.

Seriously though, it's probably because I'm a sucker for:  a)  Graham Greene, b)  Orson Welles.

Yes the order is correct on that one.

edit:  xpost AND new page removes context!  Woo!  As Well!

[girl]

You have no idea how much I love Orson Welles.  Sincerely.  I'm unabashedly obsessed with him.

[dieblucasdie]

Aren't we all?

Also!  Joseph Cotten in that movie!  He's another great straight-man-foil-rube type actor.  Which is funny, because he's mainly remembered as the creep in Shadow of a Doubt

Also, that made me think of Gaslight (because I always confuse Joseph Cotten and Charles Boyer).  Does that count as a noir?  Seems like we've got a loose definition going here, and it's so, so good.

[girl]

Yes it does!  And holy cow, do I love Ingrid Bergman!

[dieblucasdie]

Except in Notorious, which, blech.

Have you seen Witness for the Proseuction, girl?  I was talking about it the other night; You'd probably like it, it's late-50s, but it's oddly noir, even though it's more Christie than Chandler. 

[girl]

I respectfully disagree.  Somewhere in my house there's a notebook of movie quotes, but I'm not about to look for it.  Anyhow, paraphrasing from that movie, "it's been a positively dreadful party, you all have to leave". . . is an all time favorite line. 

edit:  yes.  I love Billy Wilder.

[auto-da-fey]

While y'all are talking noir, I'm watching it. Well, sort of--the sleazy Italian gialli I've been gobbling up lately really aren't that far removed. Actually, since I've apparently become fixated on De Palma without realizing it, they're really kind of the missing link between 40s noir and his slasher movies, which take a lot of their imagery from gialli (hello, hand in black leather gove with a straight razor!).

Tonight, on Sing's rec, I saw All the Colors of the Dark. It's the same director, and the exact same cast (George Hilton, Ivan Rassimov, and the unbelievably fetching Edwige Fenech, who reminds me of the porn star Annette Haven--a massive compliment) as The Strange Vice of Mrs. Wardh, one year later (1972). I think Strange Vice is a better film--Sing, if you haven't seen it, seriously check it out--but this has a definite nighmarish intensity. It's all a little too derivative of Rosemary's Baby (with a random Mickey Spillane theft/homage late in the game), but Sergio Martino keeps things nerve-wrackingly uncertain. The abundant sex doesn't hurt, either.

[auto-da-fey]

And dudes, no one mentioned D.O.A.? I love that one so much the residual affection somehow carries over to the Dennis Quaid/Meg Ryan remake, which, despite all my better judgment, I have a certain fondness for.

But the original! Sheer bliss.

[auto-da-fey]

Oh, and it kind of got buried up there, but On Reflection, I'm glad you liked Le Cercle Rouge. I'm far from a Melville expert, but certainly if you liked that you might want to check out his other work--Bob le Flambeur has a different feel, more melancholy and even wistful, but it's still a tough caper flick of the first caliber.

[girl]

added both of those to my Netflix queue.  Also, seconding D.O.A.  (I have a massive love for all things film noir.  It's far and away my favorite genre.)  Also, it's 3:49 a.m.  why am I still awake?

[On Reflection]

Oh, and it kind of got buried up there, but On Reflection, I'm glad you liked Le Cercle Rouge. I'm far from a Melville expert, but certainly if you liked that you might want to check out his other work--Bob le Flambeur has a different feel, more melancholy and even wistful, but it's still a tough caper flick of the first caliber.

Ha, well its a Melville season here on British terrestrial tv, apparently, and Bob le Flambeur is on tonight, so ima watch that too.

[das kranke Tier]

And dudes, no one mentioned D.O.A.? I love that one so much the residual affection somehow carries over to the Dennis Quaid/Meg Ryan remake, which, despite all my better judgment, I have a certain fondness for.

But the original! Sheer bliss.

Totally.  It's like the whole Desperate Hours phenom.

[joseph scott]

Aren't we all?

Also!  Joseph Cotten in that movie!  He's another great straight-man-foil-rube type actor.  Which is funny, because he's mainly remembered as the creep in Shadow of a Doubt

He's also in Foreign Correspondent, another excellent Hitchcock.

Glad someone mentioned that Gun for Hire is a good one. I've got the book on my bedside table (speaking of being a sucker for Graham Greene); I'm going to read it as soon as I'm done with my current read, and then I'm gonna watch the film.

[Aglaya]

Watched Capote last night.  I don't know if I was in the wrong mood for it or what, but it managed to be simultaneously boring and fascinating.  Like I wasn't particularly enjoying watching it, but I wanted to finish it, and I didn't want to miss anything.

[das kranke Tier]

I sort of felt the same way when I saw that.

I watched about a 1/2 hour of I Am Trying To Break Your Heart last night...I'm not a big Wilco fan or anything, but I heard that it was pretty interesting and done very well.

It kind of just made me just want to slap Jeff Tweedy.  I'm hoping my opinion changes when I finish it.

[Andrew_TSKS]

re: noir--that "essential noir" list reminds me that i still haven't watched the copy of "gun crazy" that i inherited as part of a noir dvd box set when a roommate moved out owing me money. i have seen "murder my sweet", and thought it was a decent raymond chandler adaptation, but maybe a little too light at points. the ending, for example. i like it on the whole, though--especially some of the darker, quieter scenes towards the beginning where marlowe is stalking around in foggy wilderness in the middle of the night.

also, i didn't know there was a movie of "mildred pierce". i guess i just always figured sonic youth had read a lot of james m. cain novels (which is always a good idea). also also, raymond chandler wrote the script of "blue dahlia", which i've still never seen (it's the only thing he wrote that i haven't read/seen). i'm sure it's outstanding for that reason alone.

[Andrew_TSKS]

I sort of felt the same way when I saw that.

I watched about a 1/2 hour of I Am Trying To Break Your Heart last night...I'm not a big Wilco fan or anything, but I heard that it was pretty interesting and done very well.

It kind of just made me just want to slap Jeff Tweedy.  I'm hoping my opinion changes when I finish it.

he seems like a jerk at first (the argument with jay bennett in the studio is an excellent example, though my heart goes out to him when he has to suddenly bolt out of the room and vomit due to a massive migraine. i've been there), but later in the movie, you start to realize that actually, jay is kind of set in his ways and is holding jeff back simply because he feels like his importance in the grand scheme of things in wilco is being diminished (which it wouldn't necessarily be, if he weren't responding to any and all of jeff's off-kilter suggestions the way he is). god, i don't want to ruin the movie for you, but you know what happens at the end, so i don't feel as bad mentioning all of this.

anyway, yeah, watch the whole thing, you'll probably find your sympathies changing. really, i think by the end of the movie that everyone seems sympathetic, like all of them are just doing the best they can to cope with the situation.

[titus a.]

Dude I've always been more of a Son Volt kind of guy just because I have always gotten that impression that Tweedy really is just that big of a cock though.

[das kranke Tier]

I very well might warm up to him, but yeah, he's a total douche for that first 1/2 hour...

[girl]

re: noir--. . . i have seen "murder my sweet", and thought it was a decent raymond chandler adaptation, but maybe a little too light at points. the ending, for example. i like it on the whole, though--especially some of the darker, quieter scenes towards the beginning where marlowe is stalking around in foggy wilderness in the middle of the night.

If you come across the 70s remake titled "Farewell, My Lovely" with Robert Mitchum, you'll want to watch it.  I'm a bit too much of a purist to include a movie made in the 70s as part of the classic noir canon, but it's a good movie.

[Andrew_TSKS]

ah, so they used the book's title for the remake, huh? interesting.

i will look for that. mitchum is the shit.

[auto-da-fey]

also, i didn't know there was a movie of "mildred pierce".

Joan Crawford won an Oscar for it in 1946--I'm not sure what the other noir aficionados here think, but I'd rank it as good but distinctly not great.

also also, raymond chandler wrote the script of "blue dahlia", which i've still never seen (it's the only thing he wrote that i haven't read/seen). i'm sure it's outstanding for that reason alone.

Oh man, I haven't seen this either, and it's not available on DVD in the U.S., but I actually just thought of it a few weeks ago, when I went to see Darwin's Nightmare. The screening was in this theater owned by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences--the Oscar people--and its hallways are decked out with amazing vintage movie posters. Right by the door to the screening room there's this massive Blue Dahlia one, and I remember making a mental note, "Hey, I need to see that." No progress yet, though.

[auto-da-fey]

If you come across the 70s remake titled "Farewell, My Lovely" with Robert Mitchum, you'll want to watch it.  I'm a bit too much of a purist to include a movie made in the 70s as part of the classic noir canon, but it's a good movie.

Heresy! Noir isn't time-bound! What about Chinatown? Altman's Long Goodbye?

But yeah, the Mitchum Farewell is pretty great.

[auto-da-fey]

also, i didn't know there was a movie of "mildred pierce".

Joan Crawford won an Oscar for it in 1946--I'm not sure what the other noir aficionados here think, but I'd rank it as good but distinctly not great.

Also--as just crossed my mind as I went to make breakfast--the film is really closer to melodrama than noir, if one is all rigid about categories and such.