The 10th Mofo Movie Hall of Fame

The Lucky Ones

Raul, well said! I can tell you really connected to the film. I agree with all your points too.

I thought it was cool how the film showed that all three characters were first and foremost soldiers. They breathe, think and act, soldiering. The director shows us how the three are different than civilians when they interact with non-soldiers.

I thought the end scene where they say goodbye to each other at the airport and Micheal Pena kisses Rachel McAdams goodbye showed how they were all soldiers: In most films they would have passionately kissed, falling in love and ended up together. But Pena kisses her not on the cheek, and not squarely on the lips, but off to the side of her lips (as a solider buddy might do)...And Rachel stays in soldier character with her line, 'woo, that was kinda of personal.' I just thought that was so cool.

How's everybody doing on the movies? We have 40 more days to go until the deadline.

Haven't heard from Neiba and Friendly Mushroom yet, can you guys make it in time?

Yes. I have seen five. Writeup's on Blade Runner and Lucky Ones tomorrow.

I have Dead Man's Shoes and Amour rewatch left. Kind of waiting for chatter on Empire and Blade Runner. I have seen those really recently.

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Letterboxd

Just Amour and East of Eden for me. I may still re watch all or some of Empire, Dead Man's Shoes and Blade Runner but i'm not sure as they are all fresh in my mind and i've been a bit busy. I'll see after i've watched Amour and East of Eden.

Thanks guys! Hopefully Neiba is still good to go. I have only one left Blade Runner, which I might have seen a few times before

I've been moving slow but will bang them out fast once my 50's watching is done. A rewatch of East of Eden will be next for me.

East of Eden (Elia Kazan, 1955)

Well this is my nomination and as you might guess, I think highly of it! I think it incorporates the best of John Steniback's novel, along with Elia Kazan's personal style of direction...and pairs two phenomenal actors, James Dean and Julie Harris. On top of all that, it's a very powerful story of unfulfilled love and forgiveness.

Novelist John Steinback once said of his novels, 'that he wanted to help reconnect people to their lost humanity.' He felt if his story's could point a way for people to reconnect and heal it would be a better world. And that's what this movie means to me, it's about the inability to love and the inability to forgive and the need to heal.

Steinback upon meeting James Dean said "He is Cal!"

This is the role James Dean was born to play. It's the only movie he ever lived to see released and the only one he got to watch. He died in a car crash before his other two films were released. I think Dean is amazing in this.

But it wasn't until last night that I realized just how damn good Julie Harris is. When she's doing a scene with the older brother, Aron (Richard Davalos) she's good as any other actress. But when she has scenes with James Dean she lights up and is in the moment. I watched a documentary interview with her done a few years back, and I could tell that she was deeply touched by her time working with James Dean...and it shows on the big screen, she comes alive when her and Dean are together.

I just finished watching "Dead Man's Shoes". Any guesses as to whether or not I liked it?




Review of it will definitely come this week, along with the rest of them.

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I became insane, with long intervals of horrible sanity - Edgar Allan Poe

I would have guessed you wouldn't have liked it, but now that you ask the question, I'm thinking you would only do that if you did like it. Or maybe I'm wrong?...Looking forward to reading your thoughts on it, one way or another

You despised it . Be gentle

East of Eden

I didn’t know much about this film beyond James Dean being in it, and some people not liking it because it cuts a lot out of the book. Now I haven’t read the book, so I am judging the film purely on its own merits without comparison.

There’s a definite theme of Cain and Abel running through this films - even the names, Caleb and Aron, the two sons of Adam. Cal may not kill his brother, but he does hurt him through his jealousy over things that are no fault of Aron’s and provoke him through his attentions to Aron’s fiancee. I’m not sure Aron deserved any of that and it did seem a little convenient in the end to get rid of him so Cal can have Abra and his weakened father all to himself.

At first I wasn’t sure how old Cal was supposed to be, and thought he was a bit old for throwing tantrums, but as the film progresses it becomes clear how much he both craves his father’s love and resents him for the lack of it and I thought James Dean played that well. The birthday party where his father rejects the gift Cal has been working on was really heartbreaking.

It gets a little bit hysterical and over the top at times, a bit too melodramatic for realism and the music didn’t help, but that is fairly typical of a lot of 50s films.

Aside from one ropey scene on a train near the start, it is really well shot. I really liked the angles in the scene at the table with Cal and his father and the bible and the colours are great. I really liked the whole of the fairground section as well.

Cul de Sac

The best thing I can say about this film is that it just wasn’t for me.

Overall it came across as shallow, contrived, overly quirky and unpleasant. There were odd things which were amusing -- Teresa lighting rolled up paper between the gangster’s toes, for example, and that the all important Mr Katelbach never shows up -- but for the most part I just didn’t find the comic situations particularly funny. I didn’t like any of the characters at all, a gallery of grotesques. Every time the gangster spoke it grated on my nerves and I found the constant bullying painful to watch.

It was very sixties, but not necessarily in a good way. I didn’t like the whole idea of the film questioning the masculinity of the man because his wife is “a tart” or the way she was presented in purely sexual terms (see the dvd artwork!), it all seemed very dated.

It’s difficult because I can see certain similarities to films I have liked, but it didn’t work for me; I never felt absorbed in this film.

His voice was one of my favourite things in the film haha. Cul-De-Sac seems to be pretty polarizing so far, i really liked it but can understand why others didn't.

Amour
I think that one of the faults here and so many of you have picked up on is that it relies so much on just the dialogue,
it would be much easier to get emotionally involved if some of the struggles had been shown and not just implied for example,her getting sick,when she was on the floor when he came back from the funeral etc also so little was shown of her before so there wasnt really all that big of a contrast.Also i feel like so many of her problems could have been avoided by this:

at least in the beginning.
ifeel like its trying to be a bit disconnected on purpose,sort of the anti american version where it would have gone too far to try and evoke sympathy.but theres a middle ground.
Theres always the fear,when its a foreign movie,that you might miss something because of the language barrier-when you say something,just the tone can change its meaning completely- i fear some of the dialogue was missed on me. the part where the woman says she used to listen to them make love made me cringe.
The movie definitly picks up after the first hour for me;
I thought both the main actors were wonderful-i particulary liked Anne.
I thought the scene where she had wet herself during the night was done really well,also the next scene where she is lying sick in bed and her daughter sits there completely consumed by herself-i loved the performance by Anne in that scene.Also i liked the scene where the carer combed her hair and she refused to look herself in the mirror afterwards.
one of the stand out scenes for me is also the one where he hits her.You can physically see such a change in her,i know you obviously can in prior scenes aswell,but her face just had something about it.
All in all,i like it-mostly for the last hour-theres still some scenes there though that could/should have been shortened,it did feel to go on for a bit too long and some scenes were unecassary.i like the ending-
which i personally took as him killing her then himself. him seeing her afterwards is something i took as what he wanted to happen in the afterlife.

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What I got left:

Empire Strikes Back (rewatch)
Amour (rewatch)
Blade Runner

First time for Blade Runner. Curiosity piqued.

Amazingly haven't seen it.

Indeed! I'm curious to see what you all think. So far no one has posted their thoughts on it. I've been saving if for the last, I even for the very first time bought a Blu Ray set of all 4 different Blade Runner cuts.

Reading back,Amour seems to be the one splitting opinions the most-which must mean its a great nom!

I have
Lucky ones
Empire strikes back (ill watch the first one aswell)
and Blade runner (rewatch)
left.

Considering ill be pretty hungover tomorrow,there will be plenty of time for movies