Which movie did you last see?

[Zhivago]

Just one of the best films ever made, period.

[Yazeh]

Just one of the best films ever made, period.

Totally agree

[Niner]

The 1939 MGM production of It's a Wonderful World with Jimmy Stewart and Claudette Colbert. The film is a private dick comedy. I was surprised at the number of murders, attempted murders, and scheduled executions in a 1939 comedy. I'm a fan of Jimmy Stewart and his quirkiness, but even so I can give it only 5 on my "meh" scale. (It's a 1 to 10 scale.) It can be viewed here: https://ok.ru/video/723106007554

[Sailor Kenshin]

We're on a Corman/AI B-movie kick, most of which are not even review-worthy, like Diary of a High School Bride, in which lackluster, easily manipulated idiots flounder around talking into the camera. The coffee house scenes had good music. But if you take it seriously, this turkey includes a fatality that was completely undeserved. 1959.

We move on to Premature Burial with Ray Milland, who is his usual self in this 1962 film, which I saw as a kid and thought Vincent Price was the lead, for whatever odd reason. More people acting like idiots, and near-identical twins with The Fall of the House of Usher, which DID star Vincent Price, who we are now watching in his debut film, Service Deluxe, 1938. Or should I say, crawling through. More of the above.

[Lloyd]

"Portrait of Jennie" from 1948. A lovely mixing of the romantic and the supernatural starring Joseph Cotton and Jennifer Jones.

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[Yazeh]

All that Heaven Allows 1955 - Douglas Sirk, with Jane Wyman and Rock Hudson.

Dated, dated, dated, melodrama. If they had movies in the 19th century this would be one. Especially if they killed off one of the main leads, then you'll have a perfect Puccini opera.
This will make you look like Lloyd's Avatar with it's syrupy music, burrowed by Liszt, Brahms and Schumann with bad Rachmaninov piano.
However, the lighting and the sets are impeccable, maybe too much.

The movie was remade by Fassbinder in 1974, which is a must have. And then remade by Todd Haynes in 2002, which was quite forgettable.

What is interesting when you see a "dated" film is that you start nitpicking on all the improbable stuff. Like in the middle of a snow storm (in New England) Rock Hudson lets the door of his cottage open while helping Jane Wyman put on her shoes. None of the actors flinch at the wind gusts .You know the film is being shot in sunny California with fake snow

[Sailor Kenshin]

All that Heaven Allows 1955 - Douglas Sirk, with Jane Wyman and Rock Hudson.

Dated, dated, dated, melodrama. If they had movies in the 19th century this would be one. Especially if they killed off one of the main leads, then you'll have a perfect Puccini opera.
This will make you look like Lloyd's Avatar with it's syrupy music, burrowed by Liszt, Brahms and Schumann with bad Rachmaninov piano.
However, the lighting and the sets are impeccable, maybe too much.

The movie was remade by Fassbinder in 1974, which is a must have. And then remade by Todd Haynes in 2002, which was quite forgettable.

What is interesting when you see a "dated" film is that you start nitpicking on all the improbable stuff. Like in the middle of a snow storm (in New England) Rock Hudson lets the door of his cottage open while helping Jane Wyman put on her shoes. None of the actors flinch at the wind gusts .You know the film is being shot in sunny California with fake snow

“Honey? Rudolph wants in….”

Now I gotta see this.

[Lloyd]

A British comedy from 1952 called "The Card" or "The Promoter" depending on the release. It starred Alec Guinness and Glynis Johns. While it won't place high on my comedy list, I can see why others might love it.

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[Lloyd]

"Stars in my Crown" from 1950 and starring Joel McCrea. Surprisingly good mix of small town life, family & Christian morals, and Western directed by Jacques Tourneur.

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[dneal]

Restrepo

I'd seen it before, but it was good a second time around. The actors were amazing and everything seemed convincingly real.

[Sailor Kenshin]

A British comedy from 1952 called "The Card" or "The Promoter" depending on the release. It starred Alec Guinness and Glynis Johns. While it won't place high on my comedy list, I can see why others might love it.

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Will let you know once we see it.

[kazoolaw]

Unsung Hero-movie about the Smallbone family coming to the US, the beginning of Rebecca St. James career, and the role of the mother in keeping the family together. Well-done family movie, with a faith message.

[Kaputnik]

I watched a TV movie on my computer last night, The Courageous Heart of Irena Sendler. Pretty good.

Irena Sendler (or Sendlerowa), was a Polish woman who, as part of the Polish resistance during World War II, managed to smuggle some 2500 Jewish children out of the Warsaw ghetto, giving them false identities and placing them with families, as well as in convents and orphanages.

I had drawn a picture of her in her 30s for the 2023 Inktober, prompt "angel". I also recently did a portrait of her in old age.

[Yazeh]

Movies I tried to watch but couldn't finish for various reasons.

Moonlight and Valentino, 1995 - I don't know what they were thinking. Maybe the novel was fine but the screenplay meanders and you wish all the characters dropped dead.

Anatomy of a Fall 2023- A mixture of Hitchcock and Bergman climaxes from the beginning. To intense and claustrophobic.

Zone of Interest - 2023 - Think middle Bergman (Cries and Whisper - He actually uses the same fade to red technique]. Static Ozu and distant Godard. Low angles/ high angles, Long shots / close-ups, And a most disturbing sound scape. Picturing the life of a model/ loving Teutonic Aryan family, the family of Rudolf Höss besides Auschwitz.
After watching half of the film, I much preferred cleaning my cat's litter box, than seeing "paradise" lost. If you know what I mean....

[Yazeh]

Saw a French movie The Well-Digger's Daughter 2011, based on Marcel Pagnol's work. Pagnol was both a writer and filmmaker. What makes his movies stand out like the Fanny Trilogy is the beautiful Marseille accent and colourful dialogue. The film is a bit on the sweet side (i.e not for Lloyd ), I was really moved by the story, especially the beauty of language.
However, when I discovered it was a remake, I was shocked and depressed to discover that this was not a remake/ reinterpretation but almost a shot for shot in colour.
Rewriting and rehashing stories is something eternal, from the early flood stories, Creation myths, Greek myths (especially in Opera) but to reshoot something shot by shot, leaves me baffled

[Sailor Kenshin]

That's...peculiar.

We have temporarily traded movie-watching for Cowboy Kent Rollins cooking videos.

[Yazeh]

Secrets 1933 - Precode - Mary Pickford - Leslie Howard
Remake of the 1924 movie, by the same Director Frank Borzage. Written by Frances Marion...


Weird film. Starts as a Period piece,


then a western



then a melodrama


It's intriguing if you want to hear Mary Pickford talk. But boy the story is a mishmash and Mary Pickford is often acting for a silent film. It has its moments. The 3rd act comes out completely out of the blue.
Here is supposedly why she did the film:
https://marypickford.org/caris-artic...-made-secrets/

[Kaputnik]

There's an indirect connection between the last two movies that I saw.

First was the 2011 film The Artist. It opens in 1927, with a showing of the latest silent adventure film starring "George Valentin" (think Douglas Fairbanks Sr.). The film is a hit, but the industry is changing, and the talkies are about to take over. Valentin scoffs at them, considering them a passing fad, but he finds himself out of work. A silent film that he produces and directs himself is a flop, and coincides with the stock market crash of 1929.

Meanwhile, young actress Peppy Miller, who Valentin helped and encouraged early in her career, easily makes the transition to the talkies, becoming a big star, while Valentin sinks into depression.

The film is in black and white and almost entirely silent, with title cards for the dialog, although there is background music throughout. Great performances by Jean Dujardin as George Valentin, Berenice Bejo as Peppy Miller, and Uggie the dog as Jack (a dog).

1927 was the year of what is considered the first talking film, The Jazz Singer, starring Al Jolson, although that particular film is not mentioned in The Artist. It turns out that The Jazz Singer is now in the public domain, and can be seen for free on YouTube. I watched it, and found it not bad at all. In at least one way it was quite different from my understanding of it. I had thought that it was completely silent up to the point where Al Jolson says "wait a minute, you ain't heard nothing yet", and became a talking film at that point. In fact, that's not quite right. There is musical sound track during the entire film, and even a couple of songs before that famous line. One of those songs, the sentimental "Dirty Hands, Dirty Face", comes immediately before it in fact. Then Jolson says his lines as an introduction to the upbeat song "Toot Toot Tootsie". There is no more spoken dialog after that until about a third of the way through the film, when Jolson's character and his mother, played by Eugenie Besserer, talk briefly as he plays his latest song for her.

All the rest of the dialog throughout the film is on title cards, not counting the songs. Apparently the technology for including lip synched versions of songs was a bit different than what was used to record ordinary speech, although I haven't looked into this in any more detail. In any case, the film is worth a look (and listen), not just for its historical interest, but for the story.

[Sailor Kenshin]

The Tingler, 1959, a William Castle film with Vincent Price. Stupid, but fun in a way we will never again see.

Cool cars, too.

[carlos.q]

Just watched Ender's Game (2013), a sci-fi pic I saw when it first came out. Years later I can see it for what it really is: a movie about child soldiers that commit genocide of a complete species while believing they're just playing a game. Too close to reality to be truly enjoyable.