Sophie's Choice (Alan J. Pakula, 1982)
Boring and lifeless for most the part, in terms of direction its just so standard, straightforward... uninspired. People talking for a few hours. Meryl Streep is fantastic and her performance is the only thing worth watching it for.
On Dangerous Ground (Nicholas Ray, Ida Lupino, 1951)
I thought that some parts of the script were weak and the pace seemed a bit odd, it should have been much longer, but there is just so much to love here. Great performances (including mesmerising scenes with Ida Lupino) and fantastic direction, Ray knows how to light every frame perfectly to capture all he can. Like all his films I have seen so far, its very unconventional for its genre, the snow... the blind woman... the way it treats violence. Like I said, could be longer, maybe I'm being half a popcorn too generous but this feels like its half an hour away from being a masterpiece.
Intolerance (D.W. Griffith, 1916)
The final film I had to see from the AFI Top 100 American films list, I had left it so long because of its length. I had seen a Griffith short film before, but that was ages ago and I barely remembered much. I had heard a lot about this film, and its predecessor
The Birth of a Nation, beforehand, especially in terms of its storytelling elements including its editing, so I was curious to just how great it was, and what made it so special. I actually struggled a bit in the first hour, I was watching a poor copy of it, and I found it hard to keep up with the different stories and characters. But then I switched to a better, HD, restored version and had no such problems keeping up with the story. The film is an absolute marvel. Magnificent. Such an ambitious undertaking, amazing sets (the Babylon set is insane), so many actors, costumes, multiple stories, the forever rocking cradle, this is exactly what an epic film should be. I was absolutely blown away, especially by the second/last act as everything starts to come together faster and faster, that's when you beginning to notice the genius in the storytelling and the power of the cross-cutting editing. I can't wait to see more of Griffith's feature films in the future.
A Corner in Wheat (D.W. Griffith, 1909)
No where near as ambitious as the above film, but it was still great to watch, and surely a very important film. You can see its influence on Soviet montage, I've heard its one of the first films about a social cause. Fantastic use of combining visual imagery and editing once again to juxtapose images and enforce a message, the last shot is beautiful.
Bigger Than Life (Nicholas Ray, 1956)
Decided to continue watching Ray's films and figured that as this appeared on the Fifties list it would be a good idea for my next film. It has some of the greatest cinematography I have ever seen, once again colours play such a significant in conveying the emotional state of the characters (like
Johnny Guitar), but it's not just colours, its the control Ray seems to have in every scene and how the camera is always perfectly placed to capture the mood of the characters. The mirror scenes, or when James Mason is standing over his soon trying to teach him, with his giant shadow standing in the background (above). Mason is terrific, and really horrifying. The whole thing is quite scary actually, like a weird combination of a melodrama and a horror film.
Rebel Without a Cause (Nicholas Ray, 1955)
Probably Ray's most famous film, largely down to James Dean, I didn't realise that I had actually seen the racing scene before. There's lot to admire here, once again Ray makes great use of CinemaScope and the colours are beautiful, who can forget Dean's white t-shirt, red jacket combination? The story just didn't seem to compel me on an emotional level like his other works so far.
Nights of Cabiria (Federico Fellini, 1957)
After this showed up on the countdown it soon appeared that certain MoFos really love this film and think it should be regarded as one of Fellini's greatest works. I think
8˝ and
La Dolce Vita are great, but although I find it good, I'm not a huge fan of
La Strada, so I was unsure how I would find this. I thought that the first half was great, the wandering around, finding Alberto Lazzari, all that stuff I really enjoyed. But I don't know, it started to wane on me in the second half, and I didn't really care much for the main character. Maybe it's because the ending was obvious all along, but I just didn't really emotionally care for her or get upset at the end much. Like
Marty it felt like something I should have loved and been really emotionally invested in, but just didn't turn out that way despite some good moments, and like that film, the direction was okay, solid, but nothing to really write much about, sorry.