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I rewatched Lawrence of Arabia today. Directed by legendary filmmaker David Lean, the film has a fantastic cast including Peter O'Toole, Alec Guinness, Anthony Quinn, Omar Sharif Jack Hawkins, Claude Rains and José Ferrer. It won 7 Academy Awards, including best picture and best director. This is truly an epic film, in every sense of the word. It is big, sweeping, grand, and ambitious. The film is masterfully directed and technically exceptional on all levels. The cinematography is gorgeous. The film looks incredible. Costumes, set design and production design are all top notch. The score is beautiful, memorable, and effective. Peter O'Toole gives a commanding, nearly flawless performance and the rest of the cast are great too. My only slight quibble is that I don't feel the film really needed to be as long as it is. Not everything feels completely necessary to me and it could have been just a touch shorter. I know a lot of people feel the film is perfect and I respect that, but it is not quite there for me. It's pretty close to it though. I've seen 9 films directed by David Lean and I consider Lawrence of Arabia his best work.



I've been really busy with a lot of personal and podcasting stuff, but now that January ended, I have plans to barrel through some of these. Sorry. I've enjoyed reading the reviews, though.
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Let the night air cool you off
Dog Day Afternoon

Classic film. Great directing. Great story. Great performances. I don't have anything to add to the conversation with this one as it's, to me, one of those films that just belongs in the canon. It's my favorite Pacino performance, a more nuanced performance than I think we get out of him in other films. He gets all the little details down and obviously we know he can do the big and loud scenes. The pacing of the film is perfect, we get were we need to go when we need to get there. It's already in the canon, let's keep it there. If it wins this hall of fame, I'd be just fine with that.



I rewatched Lawrence of Arabia today. My only slight quibble is that I don't feel the film really needed to be as long as it is. Not everything feels completely necessary to me and it could have been just a touch shorter. I know a lot of people feel the film is perfect and I respect that, but it is not quite there for me. It's pretty close to it though.

WRONG!!!!
Now that i have cleared that up. Does anyone know where one may get a hold of To Live and Die In LA. It is not on streaming anywhere.



Lawrence of Arabia (1962) -


This is the film I was most looking forward to revisiting. It's the kind of film where there's not much I can say about its greatness that hasn't already been said, but since I read about some controversy about the apparent white savior elements of the film, I figured I'd respond to them. First things first, I don't have an issue with the white savior trope as long as the people the white person is helping aren't depicted as dumb or incompetent, and I'd say this film accomplishes that just fine. However, to dismiss Lawrence as a white savior is an inaccurate reading of his character.
WARNING: spoilers below
Instead of being portrayed as a hero, Lawrence is instead shown to be naïve for thinking he can save the Arabic people from the Turkish army and from British colonization. The film also makes a point to nullify many of Lawrence's significant accomplishments. For instance, acting as a father figure for Daud and Farraj is countered by how they both die in his company, his rescue of Gasim is countered when he's forced to execute him shortly afterwards, his decision to blow up the Ottoman railways is countered by how he's forced to execute one of his only remaining friends, his ambush of a group of retreating Turkish soldiers is countered by how he leads to the massacre of numerous surrendering soldiers and later regrets it, and his victory in capturing Damascus is countered by how they lose the city to British rule. Most importantly though, all his accomplishments in the film are countered by how they help pave way for British colonization. Given all that, it's clear Lawrence is actually presented as a modern Icarus rather than a hero. Calling this a white savior film because of Lawrence's success against the Turkish army misses the entire point.
With that being said, The Bridge on the River Kwai is still my favorite David Lean film, mainly because the character dynamics and the final act in that film resonated with me more. If there's one area this film outshines the other one in though, it's the cinematography. In addition to having some terrific shots, like the iconic match scene and Ali's introduction, the numerous landscape views of the desert look incredible. Seemingly stretching out for miles and miles, they're at once beautiful and foreboding to look at. Overall, while I don't think this film will ever rise to favorite status, it's still great and I'm glad I was finally able to rewatch it.

Next Up: Ship of Fools



I forgot the opening line.


An Autumn Afternoon (Sanma no aji) - 1962

Directed by Yasujirô Ozu

Written by Yasujirô Ozu & Kôgo Noda

Starring Chishū Ryū, Shima Iwashita, Keiji Sada & Mariko Okada

The camera peeks up from only a foot or two off the floor, and it never moves. Characters shuffle around corridors, and establishing shots playfully misdirect the audience. If you don't know already that you're watching an Ozu movie, the familiar story will - marriage and family, youth and old age. This was Yasujirô Ozu's last film before his death, and only one of two he made that was in colour as opposed to black and white. I've been a big fan of what I've seen so far of his films, but I have to admit to being a little surprised by how similar this one is to Late Spring - it's so similar that many reviewers put it into the "remake" column. It's so difficult to judge the film by itself in that respect, because if I'd seen this before watching his other films I'd be raving, so I'll try hard to not base my thoughts on that familiarity. Instead, I'll focus on what Ozu himself might have wanted me to be focusing on - the emotional core, and the rare chance the director got to play around with colour, which he handled with the aplomb of someone who had been making colour films ever since he started his career.

Shūhei Hirayama (Chishū Ryū) is an older type guy who works in an office, and who was once a naval officer during the Second World War. He lost his wife during those war years, and lives with his younger son and daughter, Michiko (Shima Iwashita), who looks after him. His workmates are of the opinion that he should let his daughter get married instead of keeping her around taking care of him, even though his wife is gone. As if to illustrate why, Shūhei's old teacher, Sakuma (Eijirō Tōno) laments that he kept his daughter from marrying, and now she suffers a lonely fate as she's too old and still takes care of the elderly man. In the meantime, Shūhei meets Yoshitarō Sakamoto (Daisuke Katō) who was once a Petty Officer on a ship which he served on. Yoshitarō takes Shūhei to a bar where the latter meets a woman who reminds him of his wife. He decides that it is indeed time his daughter got married, and that he took more responsibility as far as looking after himself is concerned. In the meantime, Shūhei's older son Kōichi (Keiji Sada) struggles to find a balance between being financially responsible and enjoying life when he seeks to buy some expensive golf clubs.

When you zero in on the emotional stakes in the story, and where our attention is directed, you can see one clear and major difference this film has to Late Spring. In that film, we're more concerned with how the daughter is faring feelings-wise, and with this film it's the father. The daughter isn't paid much attention or given much film time, and we stick with the father throughout - right to the end when we get to one of Yasujirô Ozu's patented bitter-sweet and sorrowful endings. In this, the father has held onto his daughter for too long, or at least he feels that way. When he suddenly decides to "marry her off" (an expression I really hate) he's not at all prepared for the experience, and he likens the wedding to a funeral. After the wedding we spend some time in what feels like a deserted and empty house - bereft of life, love, and full of darkness and shadows. In one lonely corner of the house, Shūhei Hirayama cries. The difference for me personally with this ending is that Japanese men are so stoic - I feel something, but it still pales beside the utter sorrow I felt at the end of Late Spring.

Ozu had his usual cinematographer on this film, Yûharu Atsuta, with whom he had made many of his most famous films. The visual style is interesting - there's several visual motifs, one which insists on the repetition of red and white - a favourite Japanese combination - which we see over and over again. The shots from low angle (nearly the ground) are an expected style, and often the shots are framed in very exacting ways - there's little that's natural, and a lot of tight geometric spaces are balanced. Everything feels very exactly timed, like clockwork, and even bottles and bowls take up absolutely precise spaces. It all reinforces that cultural gap that I have with Japan and the Japanese, where my table layout in comparison could be considered the aftermath of some disaster compared to the inch-perfect sake bottles, and noodle dishes. I love the way we're teased sometimes when scenes shift, and we're never quite sure where we're off to when new establishing shots give us few indications where we're going but very specific items to look at. Ozu's film language is very much his own, and has rarely, if ever, been imitated.

The composer for An Autumn Afternoon's score was someone who had arrived on the scene in time for Ozu's Tokyo Story, and here delivers a typically wistful strain of light melodic daydreaming. Takanobu Saitô also made his name by being lucky enough to be associated with this Japanese filmmaker. It's as fitting as a score could possibly be, and is taken into account along with everything else when I judge this movie as it's own entity. It can sound like I'm harping on a film I dislike when I compare this to Late Spring, but really it's just a shade different but made with all of the exacting quality that all of Ozu's films seem to be - and I enjoyed listening to this film as much as I enjoyed watching it. Funnily enough if I wasn't familiar with it, and someone had put a blindfold on me I'd say I was definitely listening to something French, with the violins and the way it sounds anything but Japanese and exactly like French music. I'm sure the French appreciated this because towards the end of Ozu's career his stuff really started taking off in France.

There was a mix of old and new at Shochiku studios where production designers and costumers were concerned, where a panic was on due to a sudden steep decline in cinema patrons going out to see movies over the past three to four years, and cost-cutting measures were in effect. Ozu had the same editor, Yoshiyasu Hamamura, putting his film together so all the the main elements were part of a steady and consistent line for him. The director died on his 60th birthday, seeming to keep even that along strictly exacting guidelines, but it's unlikely that he knew that this film would be his last. It gladdens me to know that it's a celebrated part of his library all the same, and not some last gasp from a fading artist losing control of his fine judgement. I enjoy watching it, and it's definitely something I intend to watch again at some stage - perhaps as part of an Ozu marathon when I have a few more of his films under my belt and perhaps a biography to boot. He seems to be an essential component of cinema itself.

An Autumn Afternoon was my third Ozu film, and as such I was wise to his methods. Otherwise I would have been like I was in the past watching his films - impatient, and not realising that these films are concerned with the small details, the building emotions in all of the players and how that pays off as a whole when we reach the end of a poetic journey. At first these films astound in just how prosaic, slow and measured they are as we work our way forward scene by scene. There's repetition (repetition within repetition when you consider his films as a whole repeated as he went along) just like in poetry, and sometimes the lyricism is lost on us, because what Ozu shows us is a modern Japan full of offices, houses, streets, buildings - all functional and geometric. It's the last place we'd look for the beautiful and the lyrical, but Ozu is showing us where the beauty still sits at the center of the Japanese family. Often it doesn't dawn on us until the very last scene - and then we need to see the film again.

Lastly, to Chishû Ryû, who has played the same part in every Yasujirô Ozu film I've watched so far - this seemed to have been the biggest challenge out of all of them. It was his turn to have his character's heart broken, and he can't rely on histrionics or tantrums to get through to us the myriad things he's feeling. He has to do that in the most subtle of ways, and I suppose you don't get nearly 300 credits to your name if you don't possess some etherical acting ability and attract one of the titans of the industry, becoming part of that family which sadly met it's end after this film was released. I wonder if anyone has thought about making a fictional representation of what it was like for the various members of Ozu's family of filmmakers after he departed and they realised that they'd made their last film together - whether there was any Ozu-like stoic drama associated with one last get-together to say farewell to that rarified air. It would have been just like the end of An Autumn Afternoon - a darkened film studio, where all is quiet except for one actor remaining behind to shed that very last tear with dignity and the bitter-sweet memories of a wonderful past.

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Remember - everything has an ending except hope, and sausages - they have two.
We miss you Takoma

Latest Review : Le Circle Rouge (1970)



Women will be your undoing, Pépé



Ship of Fools (1965)
Glocken: One of the saddest things in the world must be to see two people who feel so much for each other and who feel that they belong together and, yet, they really don't belong together at all.

My initial interest, MyGirl! Simone Signoret and what would be one of oh so many reasons for my appreciation to rise and rise for this ensemble cast on a 26-day ship voyage in 1933 from Veracruz, Mexico, to Bremerhaven, Germany. The tagline's description of EXPLORER, MISTRESS, VAGRANT, LOAFER, ARTIST, TRAMP ... THEY ARE ALL AT THE CAPTAIN'S TABLE! Setting the bar for both the ship's officers and the guests. Along with 600 Spanish workers picked up in Cuba, stuffed like cattle on a separate, lower section of the deck.
Along with Simone's La Condesa, playing the Ship Docter with such a genuinely subtle mastery is Oskar Werner. Quite the captivating performance to the point that on this second rewatch, along with the others, his screen time with My Girl! struck the most profound chord for me. While on the opposite end of pure dark amusement were the Spanish dancers who cheered one another in performance but were continually at one another's throats when seen about the ship.
Sharing equal time to explore their characters entirely are Lee Marvin's wreckless, ill-tempered, belligerent drunk veneer attempting to hide the fractured soul beneath. Vivian Leigh, a lady of cynical memes of hard-earned wisdom named Mrs. Treadwell. Along with George Segal, the emotionally lost artist. José Ferrer, whom I so RARELY see beyond my countless rewatches of Cyrano de Bergerac, playing a Nationalist German.
ANNND those always delightful surprises of beloved characters from a favorite show appearing in a film. Mine was Michael Dunn --

from guest appearances on the Original Star Trek and notably on Wild, Wild West as the iconic arch-villain Dr. Miguelito Loveless. Our opening and closing host and participant of this cruise. My second viewing endeared me to his subtle layers.
The second surprise was Colonel Klink from Hogan's Heroes Werner Klemperer --

as a lower officer on the ship making moves on a disinterested Vivian Leigh. Showing a more dramatic turn than the comedic foil I have seen him as.

Each character, every personal story of inner turmoil, and vented passion is beautifully interwoven with an orchestration that is so sublime; there is never a bump or awkward shift; we glide through each variance of emotion and the actions that illuminate and, at times, ignite them with equally regarded and engaging supporting characters. This is visually enhanced by a well-earned Oscar for Best Cinematography, Black-and-White by Ernest Laszlo. (F@ckin BRAVO, sir).
I must also express a love for the poignant dialogue on this twenty-six-day cruise. A fitting locale for strangers to express deep-rooted emotions and inner flaws that we forever fumble with those closest to us—so many excellent lines and debates throughout to list.
With so many incredible films that I rarely revisit, I am delighted I got to with this one.
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Just started Dead Man's Letters. I also have a pending review from The Uninvited.



2022 Mofo Fantasy Football Champ
WRONG!!!!
Now that i have cleared that up. Does anyone know where one may get a hold of To Live and Die In LA. It is not on streaming anywhere.
I can't find it either if someone can help me. Thanks



2022 Mofo Fantasy Football Champ
To Live and Die in L.A.



I feel like this is another of those films that probably just works better for a viewer if you saw it back then, because it feels a bit outdated. Not from a visual standpoint though, I thought the L.A. backdrop looked really cool and the film looked quite crisp and vibrant for an 80s film. But I feel the story is just overall dated. There are certain scenes that I thought were really well filmed. I liked how they filmed the Dafoe in the kitchen scene with the guy with the gun in the hallway. Stuff like that really works for me from a filming standpoint. Like others have said though a lot of the characters other than Dafoe come off flat and that unfortunately kills my enjoyment of the film overall. It's not anything bad but it's just nothing groundbreaking either.




2022 Mofo Fantasy Football Champ
1 month to go until the deadline, March 7th. I'm not planning on extending the deadline. So if you can't make it now is a good time to let us know.

@Allaby 10/11
@beelzebubble 8/11
@SpelingError 7/11
@Phoenix 6/11
@rauldc14 6/11
@Siddon 6/11
@edarsenal 3/11
@jiraffejustin 3/11
@MovieGal 2/11
@Thief 2/11
I'll try my damnedest to see Arabia before then. That will be my biggest challenge of the lot. I'm assuming I won't have to see The Uninvited since Moviegal won't finish by then.



I'll try my damnedest to see Arabia before then. That will be my biggest challenge of the lot. I'm assuming I won't have to see The Uninvited since Moviegal won't finish by then.
Of course if you've seen Lawrence of Arabia you don't have to rewatch it, but if you haven't seen it it's well worth watching.

As far as Moviegal's nom The Uninvited all I can say is MG told me twice that she was still in, that was some time ago. She hasn't been on the board for 2 weeks. The Uninvited is optional to watch per the rules. If we don't hear from MG in 2 weeks from now it will have to be removed. Good movie though.



2022 Mofo Fantasy Football Champ
Of course if you've seen Lawrence of Arabia you don't have to rewatch it, but if you haven't seen it it's well worth watching.

As far as Moviegal's nom The Uninvited all I can say is MG told me twice that she was still in, that was some time ago. She hasn't been on the board for 2 weeks. The Uninvited is optional to watch per the rules. If we don't hear from MG in 2 weeks from now it will have to be removed. Good movie though.
It's been so damn long I couldn't properly rate it



It's been so damn long I couldn't properly rate it
I see. Funny thing for me is that if I watch a film at the start of an HOF by the end I can't remember it So I started keeping the noms in a text file and ordered my list as I watched each one of them. If I had to make my ballot list right now it would be tough.



1 month to go until the deadline, March 7th. I'm not planning on extending the deadline. So if you can't make it now is a good time to let us know.

@Allaby 10/11
@beelzebubble 8/11
@SpelingError 7/11
@Phoenix 6/11
@rauldc14 6/11
@Siddon 6/11
@edarsenal 3/11
@jiraffejustin 3/11
@MovieGal 2/11
@Thief 2/11
I'm already at 4/11. Need to catch up with reviews, but I think I can make it.