I'm with y'all. The first time I saw it, I didn't connect much with the movie (and, to be fair, I was high as a bat at the time). Over time, it's become my favorite of theirs.
Anybody can be a prop class clown.
Xander ,'Touched'
Buffista Movies 5: Development Hell
A place to talk about movies--old and new, good and bad, high art and high cheese. It's the place to place your kittens on the award winners, gossip about upcoming fims and discuss DVD releases and extras. Spoiler policy: White font all plot-related discussion until a movie's been in wide release two weeks, and keep the major HSQ in white font until two weeks after the video/DVD release.
Hayden - Nov 06, 2006 8:42:57 am PST #5490 of 10001
aka "The artist formerly known as Corwood Industries."
DavidS - Nov 06, 2006 8:43:33 am PST #5491 of 10001
"Look, son, if it's good enough for Shirley Bassey, it's good enough for you."
what's Miller's Crossing if not noir?
Dude! (so to speak) It is a gangster movie. Which really is a genre.
Sean K - Nov 06, 2006 8:44:04 am PST #5492 of 10001
You can't leave me to my own devices; my devices are Nap and Eat. -Zenkitty
The Big Lebowski, which I loathe (I know, I know).
::shuns megan and Plei and Alieann forever::
Frankenbuddha - Nov 06, 2006 8:44:22 am PST #5493 of 10001
"We are the Goon Squad and we're coming to town...Beep! Beep!" - David Bowie, "Fashion"
The Big Lebowski is completely a noir parody. The Dude is Marlowe as a stoner/draft dodger instead of a WWII vet.
Of course, Altman had kinda already done this in THE LONG GOODBYE, albeit with more of a hipster/beatnik Marlowe, and somewhat less overtly parodic (though ultimately probably much more subversively).
Jessica - Nov 06, 2006 8:46:02 am PST #5494 of 10001
And then Ortus came and said "It's Ortin' time" and they all Orted off into the sunset
So, people who didn't think much of it the first time around, what made you rewatch? (I ask because I was also unimpressed and a little bored by Lebowski, but it's never occurred to me that I should give it another try. There just didn't seem to be enough there there for a second viewing.)
DavidS - Nov 06, 2006 8:47:02 am PST #5495 of 10001
"Look, son, if it's good enough for Shirley Bassey, it's good enough for you."
Well, I think the French critics that named it certainly looked at it in that way. I would tend to say that it has evolved into a genre, that is, I think that today one can say a film is noir and the audience would have certain aesthetic and narrative expectations of that film.
Right. Neo-Noir is a genre. Original Noir? A cycle. Similarly you could copy elements from the French New Wave cycle and turn them into a genre.
You know what genre really boggles me? German alpine movies from the 30s.
Hayden - Nov 06, 2006 8:47:06 am PST #5496 of 10001
aka "The artist formerly known as Corwood Industries."
Dude! (so to speak) It is a gangster movie. Which really is a genre.
Yeah, it has gangsters, but it's nothing like The Godfather or G2 or The Sopranos. Maybe White Heat.
megan walker - Nov 06, 2006 8:48:26 am PST #5497 of 10001
"What kind of magical sunshine and lollipop world do you live in? Because you need to be medicated."-SFist
Of course, Altman had kinda already done this in THE LONG GOODBYE.
Which I also hated. And I generally love the Coen brothers and Altman. I guess Bogie=Marlowe for me and I don't want anybody to mess with that.
DavidS - Nov 06, 2006 8:50:29 am PST #5498 of 10001
"Look, son, if it's good enough for Shirley Bassey, it's good enough for you."
Yeah, it has gangsters, but it's nothing like The Godfather or G2 or The Sopranos. Maybe White Heat.
Well, see you're citing movies which are themselves very late additions to a genre which has its origins in the 30s with The Public Enemy and (the original) Scarface. Of course the Coen's are going to go to the source, rather than contemporary reworkings of the Gangster film. Miller's Crossing does have a lot in common with movies like A Better Tomorrow. All about the loyalties and the cross-purposes, and the getting and holding power.
Sean K - Nov 06, 2006 8:51:36 am PST #5499 of 10001
You can't leave me to my own devices; my devices are Nap and Eat. -Zenkitty
So, people who didn't think much of it the first time around, what made you rewatch?
As should be obvious, I liked it the first time, so this isn't directed at me so much, but one of the reasons I rewatched it was having lived in LA for a few years. It takes on some new layers if you've lived here. It's a very LA movie. Or, more appropriately, it's a very North Hollywood movie, in that it captures a little of the experience of the people who are not filthy rich, or in show buisiness, or fabulous artists, but still live in LA. The mundane, average people who live in the midst of the other craziness in this weird and wacky city.