the movie goes a long way towards doing its best to stretch that stuff out so it becomes just as mundane to the viewer.

I still think this is the kiss of death to any movie. "Mundane" is, generally speaking, a word to avoid evoking.

I do think there's a difference between movie-spectacle and lack of narrative. I mean, in musicals, yes the plot comes to a complete halt for the song to proceed, but that song contains clues about the emotions and motivations of the characters. Even the wordless dance sequences with Cyd Charisse in Singin in the Rain show what it is Gene Kelly gotta dance about. (And are full of this wonderful longing.) Of course, in West Side Story, a major plot point happens wordlessly in song, as Tony and Maria meet and fall in love.

I would call The Thin Red Line about 80% narrative-free, focussing instead on the beauty of the landscape (that the soldiers are churning up as they cross it). The other 20% was dress rehearsal for The Passion of the Christ, so I coulda lived without it anyway. But, you know, some people did like it. (Me, I like Malick more when he can make his sense of beauty serve a story.)

I think 2001 is the kind of movie that now, in the fullness of my adult understanding, I can appreciate as long as I never see it again. I can think about its intent and technique and processes (and poor dumb HAL, who was the only character who moved me), as long as I can forget the boring parts.

I think 2001 now suffers on two points, neither of which are the actual point. One is, as stated the unspecialness of the effects. To that end, I think a Jurassic Park or Terminator 2 does a better job (not saying they are better movies, note) of doing big new things with SFX, but not spending too much time dwelling on them.

And then there's space. I think we're horribly blasé about it now. So the whole looking and revelling thing? Not so exciting. We're used to space with thing happening (which pretty much means explosions or chases) in it.

I saw Garden State yesterday. It is fantastic -- I think I liked it more than (or, at least as much as) Lost in Translation, which is high praise.

Two plot questions, whitefonted for the sensitive:

1. The journey Mark takes Andrew on on his last full day in town -- was he actually doing what he seemed to be doing, that is, trading favors until he could get the necklace back from the antique dealer? Or was it all a ruse so Andrew would appreciate the necklace when he got it, in a way he wouldn't have if Mark had just handed it over? I thought the latter, my husband the former.

2. This is a nitpicky thing, but did it bug anyone else that Sam didn't seem to actually need to go to work at any point during the filmm, after it is established that she needs her job for the health insurance?

I'ma see Hero today. Last night I watched Battle Royale on DVD. This is a Japanese film that has the girl who played GoGo in Kill Bill (pretty briefly, though). The movie kicked ass. Loved it. It's about a (fictional) battle that they stage once a year in Japan in which they choose a 7th grade class to fight to the death for 3 days. Only one person is allowed to survive. If you refuse to fight, you get killed by the peeps who run the battle at the end of the 3rd day. It was really, really good.

Well, I have seen footage of a pigeon and a cat subject to zero-G.

(The cat dealt with it better.)

Cats are so blase about everything, though. It had to skew the results....

I would call The Thin Red Line about 80% narrative-free, focussing instead on the beauty of the landscape

That's a movie that's about 2 hours too long -- 2 hours which would have been easily excised by dropping all the long shots of Jesus-actor's intense inscrutable gaze.

My plan for today is to see Garden State. I love my neighborhood indie theatre.

I still think this is the kiss of death to any movie. "Mundane" is, generally speaking, a word to avoid evoking.

Well, that depends - if it's intent is satiracal, then the "mundane" is serving its function.

I find 2001 laugh out loud funny in parts because of the juxtaposition of awesome technololgy vs. how boring the people are, and how petty their situations are.

attn: Frankenbuddha

I bought a DVD of Dementia this weekend (not to be confused with Francis Ford Coppola's first movie Dementia 13).

It's undoubtedly the best beat noir silent expressionist psychodrama of the early fifties I've ever seen.

As I watched the movie (only 55 minutes long) it seemed both utterly unlike anything I'd ever seen, and naggingly similar to a very few other movies.

It's shot in Venice, CA, so automatically it resonates with Touch of Evil (also shot in Venice. They both use the lone arcade in Venice which looks so great in b/w). In fact, I had the feeling Welles might have seen this, because it really seems to foreshadow some things in ToE.

It also reminded me of Plan 9 From Outer Space - that is, if Ed Wood were pretentious and competent. It's beautifully shot - by the very same cinemtographer that worked with Wood.

But mostly it reminded me of Carnival of Souls. It's odd and haunting. The Freudian psychodrama was too explicit at times - schematic and paint-by-numbers. But it still managed to touch on that same magical vibe you find in key surreal films as varied as Feuilldes serials, Maya Deren's Meshes of the Afternoon and, of course, Bunuel and Cocteau.

But...fifties. With a big scene in a jazz nightclub. With noir lightning. And, I mentioned its a silent movie from the fifties, right?

The movie couldn't get past the film censor board (it was submitted 11 times). So odd, because it's really not explicit in anything, but just disbturbing in its atmosphere and the Freudian hoo haw. It got bought, and Ed McMahon (of all people) slapped on a portentious voice over and it was finally released years later as Daughter of Horror.

Kill Bill question:

When Uma's character sees someone that causes her to flashback in a fit of rage, there's this loud music that plays as teh screen goes red. I recognize the music - something from a '70s TV show?

It's been bugging me since I first saw vol. 1.

I recognize the music - something from a '70s TV show?

Theme from Ironside.

That was the one with the dude in the wheelchair, right?

Haven't seen that show since I was a kid.

As I type this, Uma is wheeling herself in a wheelchair....