'Objects In Space'
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.
Well, then - are there personal 100% movies?
Night of the Hunter - perfect.
Sunset Boulevard - perfect.
Touch of Evil - perfect.
L'atlante - better than perfect.
Rushmore - perfect for me.
The Lady Eve - sheer perfection. Could not be improved.
Yessir, all of those plus:
The Rules of the Game
The Grand Illusion
Ikiru
Zero For Conduct
Vertigo
The Wild Bunch (can't leave that off, or David will think I've gone soft)
Unfaithfully Yours
Chinatown
and, truth be told, it would be easier to talk about my favorite movies that are perfect because of their flaws.
Continuity errors bug me. Poorly delivered lines bug me. Cameras reflected in windows bug me. So I guess that means I have no personal 100% movies. I've got plenty of 99%s, though.
Continuity errors bug me. Poorly delivered lines bug me. Cameras reflected in windows bug me.
Laga, you should look into a career as a script supervisor. Not at all kidding. They can make pretty good money.
I generally ignore continuity errors unless they're really obvious. If that's what I'm paying attention to, there's something else wrong with the movie besides the continuity errors. Poorly delivered lines bug me too, though. But movie making really happens in the editing room. Many scenes are significantly altered from how they were performed, or even invented whole cloth in the editing room. Assembled from spare parts. The editor (along with the director) has complete control over which take gets used.
I loved it, but for me, it's an amazing story, I'm not sure it's a "good" film.
Yes, exactly. It was wonderful to watch, but the filmmakers were pretty much handed the movie on a silver platter once they picked their subject. (And I'm willing to be convinced that picking a good story is a big enough part of documentary filmmaking that I'm being unfairly dismissive. But I do think there's a qualitative difference between someone finding a good story and presenting it vs something like Fast, Cheap and Out of Control where the subjects are presented in such a transformative way. Could I be any more of a film school asshole in this paragraph? I think not!)
I generally ignore continuity errors unless they're really obvious. If that's what I'm paying attention to, there's something else wrong with the movie besides the continuity errors.
SO much this. If my brain is so disengaged that I'm thinking "hey, that lamp wasn't turned on in the reverse shot," it's a good chance the acting/writing/editing isn't very good either.
Or it's a movie I've seen a thousand times and the little glitches become like grease stains on a well-loved cookbook. The tiny little imperfections that remind us that this piece of art was made by people.
The editor (along with the director) has complete control over which take gets used.
Totally. Well, depending on seniority and temperment it may be the director or the producer making the actual editing decisions, but the point still holds that movies are created in post.
The Wild Bunch (can't leave that off, or David will think I've gone soft)
Yeah, ya pudknocker! Admit it, you're hot for beefy dudes sweating whiskey and nicotine through their huge open pores as captured in unflattering natural light in tight close up. Followed by homosocial dickwaving bonding and gut-shot bleeding.
I know I missed the point of that one. So many smart guys love it so, and yet?
Ethan is seeing 9 in about 20 minutes.
SO. JEALOUS.
That doesn't get released until September, right?
SO. JEALOUS.
Me too. The trailers look fantastic. What studio did it?