That is a great line-up. I'd second the recommendation for any of them. Love
The Killers. The Awful Truth
has one of my favorite lines ever, namely, "I wouldn't go on living with you if you were dipped in platinum!" I just rewatched
To Catch a Thief
recently to make sure it was okay to give my step-nieces (they are Fancy Nancy fans and I wanted to give them one Grace Kelly and one Audrey Hepburn film). Wow, do the innuendos fly fast and furious in that one. In a word, awesome.
I haven't seen
The Bad and the Beautiful
but I'll definitely try to check out.
We're watching Anatomy of a Murder tonight in my law class. I've never seen it.
I LOVE the moment when George C. Scott makes the wrong conclusion about the witness he's examining.
Also, the "that's how these things go" from Jimmy Stewart at the end of the movie.
Oops, I replied under JZ's login
I haven't seen The Bad and the Beautiful but I'll definitely try to check out.
It's ripe melodrama but sharp and knowing too. Gorgeously shot (I have a thing for those little Hollywood bungalows and mid-century furnishings) and Lana's in her physical prime (Kirk too), but they both have limits as actors. Which isn't such an issue here since they don't have to stretch a ton. The movie has an interestingly ambivalent attitude about Kirk's bastard producer character.
Sunset Boulevard, 2/22. If you haven't seen it...What can I say?! It's one of my all-time favorite movies. Hollywood Gothic Supremo. Very darkly funny but also tragic, and deep deep in Hollywood lore.
Amen. So meta. So amazing.
It was cool, but I'm not as willing as that movie is to call Nora Desmond disgusting for being sexual at, what? forty?
Much as I hate that "cougar" thing(and I absolutely do, no question) I prefer it to Holden's naked repulsion when she comes on to him.
Both attitudes, though, make me wish I lived in France or somewhere.
Our local indie movie theater is in the middle of a film noir festival, and the lineup is pretty amazing. We went to see
The Third Man
and
Footsteps in the Fog
over the weekend, and Mark went out to see
Quai des Orfevres
last night. We're planning to catch
Diabolique, Rififi, Pepe le Moko, Get Carter,
and
Odd Man Out,
at the least.
I had never seen
The Third Man
before and was awed by the look of it: all those gorgeous, baroque old buildings, the Old World cobblestoned streets, the huge and lavishly furnished apartments and broad echoing stairways... all surrounded by piles of rubble, the litter and half-destroyed buildings left behind by bombing campaigns.
Storywise, I enjoyed the movie but didn't feel fully engaged with it. I'd completely forgotten Orson Welles was even in it until he showed up halfway through, and then I wished he'd been there from the start -- he was easily the most compelling character in the movie.
Footsteps in the Fog
This was part of the noir festival here this year, but I missed it.
Diabolique
and
Rififi
are great. As is
Pépé le moko,
although I wouldn't call it noir.
I agree with Megan, natch. And yeah, Orson Welles gives The Third Man quite a kick in the butt, but maybe the brevity of his role is why it works so well.
Esquire has an utterly heartbreaking and beautiful article about Roger Ebert: [link]
I FINALLY had the experience where I look for a movie on the TV schedule on a whim, and it's there! With
Laura.
I just read the book, and read that the author wasn't crazy about the movie, but still. (There's this Femmes Fatales: Women Write Pulp reprint series that is not movies, but still of interest!)