I remember you loved this. Cozzi also made a cracking giallo called The Killer Must Kill Again. Worth tracking down.
I Hate The Film Canon: A Thread
- Thread starter CrowleyHead
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I remember you loved this. Cozzi also made a cracking giallo called The Killer Must Kill Again. Worth tracking down.
Yeah it is loved by lots of normal people, but:
1) Isn't taken at all seriously by you lot or the people I discourse with in a sophisticated way (who can even accept my unconditional adoration of Ghostbusters) because of its mushy and moral elements. (Same applies Moonstruck which is greater than any Woody Allen movies apart from Hannah and Her Sisters and Zelig, but never gets recognised as such. See also The Goodbye Girl.)
2) In the Harold Ramis obituaries it barely seemed to get a mention, despite being the second best thing he ever did, the best being Ghostbusters.
3) It has mush, but also serious hard edges, like the repeated attempts at suicide. Lots of people take endless and different lessons from it, to this day. It is a repeatable and profound classic.
1) Isn't taken at all seriously by you lot or the people I discourse with in a sophisticated way (who can even accept my unconditional adoration of Ghostbusters) because of its mushy and moral elements. (Same applies Moonstruck which is greater than any Woody Allen movies apart from Hannah and Her Sisters and Zelig, but never gets recognised as such. See also The Goodbye Girl.)
2) In the Harold Ramis obituaries it barely seemed to get a mention, despite being the second best thing he ever did, the best being Ghostbusters.
3) It has mush, but also serious hard edges, like the repeated attempts at suicide. Lots of people take endless and different lessons from it, to this day. It is a repeatable and profound classic.
Corpsey
bandz ahoy
Yeah, it's quite amazing really how Groundhog Day has this reputation as a warm, fuzzy, mushy feelgood movie but has all the suicides and crimes and callous seductions in it. And the fact of the matter is that selfish hedonism, while a lot of fun to a point, is ultimately unsatisfying for the non psychopathic.
Reminds me of one of Kurosawa's films, actually, the wonderful Ikiru. (Though I presume Ramis's model was It's A Wonderful Life.)
Reminds me of one of Kurosawa's films, actually, the wonderful Ikiru. (Though I presume Ramis's model was It's A Wonderful Life.)
sadmanbarty
Well-known member
Halloween's great
Cohen brothers- shite
kubrick- the shining's great, the rest is awful
lynch- blue velvet's good, the rest is shite
copolla- godfather 1 & 2 and apocalypse now are great
scorsese- all the classics are great
Cohen brothers- shite
kubrick- the shining's great, the rest is awful
lynch- blue velvet's good, the rest is shite
copolla- godfather 1 & 2 and apocalypse now are great
scorsese- all the classics are great
sadmanbarty
Well-known member
anything not in english is rubbish
sadmanbarty
Well-known member
bill murry's awful
Corpsey
bandz ahoy
This explains your aversion to Kubrick and the Cohens I suppose.
I wonder if those who hate the Cohens hate "No Country for Old Men", which to me seemed the least Cohen-y thing they ever made. And probably the best.
(I'm a fan, though I can totally see why people dislike their movies. The irony, the smugness, the condescension, and so on. I didn't care for Hail, Caesar, really, in spite of Channing Tatum. But "Fargo", "The Big Lebowski", "A Serious Man", "Burn After Reading"...)
Corpsey
bandz ahoy
Just been reading a book about Lucien Freud, who hated Leonardo Da Vinci and Raphael. One look at his paintings would probably tell you why. He wanted paintings to be true to life, uncomposed, with a sense of mortality to them. I think artists tend to hold the most extreme of iconoclastic opinions because they also tend to be the ones who hold the extremity of preferences necessary to spur them on to create things. Whereas the art historian or cinema historian are more inclined to subscribe to canons, and to identify things they like, or that others like, in stuff they feel no personal sympathy for.
baboon2004
Darned cockwombles.
There have been some lovely French films, but I nonetheless support this sentiment. The worst French films are execrable.
Lars von Trier is probably the worst filmmaker alive, in terms of how far his renown outstrips his talent.
21Grams probably the worst film Ive seen that is allegedly 'good'. Only a lunatic would hire both Sean Penn and Charlotte Gainsbourg.
baboon2004
Darned cockwombles.
Scorsese veers between the excellent - King of Comedy, Goodfellas - and the unwatchably dull - Mean Streets, Raging Bull.
Kubrick and Lynch both made missteps but seem essential to me. Both widened the posdibilities of cinema.
Kubrick and Lynch both made missteps but seem essential to me. Both widened the posdibilities of cinema.
CrowleyHead
Well-known member
Craner hating Kubrick but defending Moonstruck and One From the Heart makes him a man after my own heart (pun not intended) AND Bill Murray is a disease so barty's right as well.
Carpenter's totally in the canon, at least on this end of the ocean. Every fucking film nerd wants to cry about how Robert Rodriguez remaking a shitty sci-fi dystopia film with bad acting, no real plot and no sense of cinematography shouldn't be touched by a fellow genre-film dweeb. Bullshit. Look at "Vampires" and tell me John Carpenter is SO VASTLY SUPERIOR a director than Rodriguez. Furthermore all these mouth-breathers with their clammy handed fawning of his synth soundtracks make me wretch. I want to club these people to death with their VHS collections.
I like a few French directors so I can't cosign Craner but there is something about their insistent need to be stilted that's insufferable. That's why Carax is actually better than Godard, you get the idea he's someone who goes through emotional reactions but doesn't know how to place what his sensations are making him do it. Also most of the 60s French Culture all fell in love with Bridget Bardot, who has racist teeth so... I don't have to say much.
I should say, the majority of Lynch's movies require you to understand the American Rural Suburb to a degree (of which I have no fucking time for) so I get why everyone here would have more or less muted responses. Its just in America people lose their fucking mind for an old man who's overly obsessed with the 50s and girls crying. Dune was a classic though, leave it to a man with a Bunuel fetish to make an esoteric book like that still feel that way, let alone how he got to play with design with all that money. Shame people would rather fawn over tripe like Blue Velvet.
Carpenter's totally in the canon, at least on this end of the ocean. Every fucking film nerd wants to cry about how Robert Rodriguez remaking a shitty sci-fi dystopia film with bad acting, no real plot and no sense of cinematography shouldn't be touched by a fellow genre-film dweeb. Bullshit. Look at "Vampires" and tell me John Carpenter is SO VASTLY SUPERIOR a director than Rodriguez. Furthermore all these mouth-breathers with their clammy handed fawning of his synth soundtracks make me wretch. I want to club these people to death with their VHS collections.
I like a few French directors so I can't cosign Craner but there is something about their insistent need to be stilted that's insufferable. That's why Carax is actually better than Godard, you get the idea he's someone who goes through emotional reactions but doesn't know how to place what his sensations are making him do it. Also most of the 60s French Culture all fell in love with Bridget Bardot, who has racist teeth so... I don't have to say much.
I should say, the majority of Lynch's movies require you to understand the American Rural Suburb to a degree (of which I have no fucking time for) so I get why everyone here would have more or less muted responses. Its just in America people lose their fucking mind for an old man who's overly obsessed with the 50s and girls crying. Dune was a classic though, leave it to a man with a Bunuel fetish to make an esoteric book like that still feel that way, let alone how he got to play with design with all that money. Shame people would rather fawn over tripe like Blue Velvet.
False narrative. Vampires is his nadir. Came after the awful escape from LA. laughably bad and universally derided. Its like judging Tobe Hooper on 'Crocodile'.
CrowleyHead
Well-known member
Droid actually found me on twitter, called me out! Tried to list the classics of Carpenter! I cut them all down, reduce them to ash. Rubbish. He has no classics. He's a man for people who still want to hang onto their Saturday Morning Cartoons. And that's why Rob Zombie's second Halloween is a better movie than the old man could ever manage.