| Author | Message | ||
     Lincoln_brown (Lincoln_brown) Username: Lincoln_brown Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 124.176.199.146 |
Am I the only person who didn't like this film? | ||
| Chris_morris (Chris_morris) Username: Chris_morris Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 98.220.71.248 |
Craig, as I recall, also didn't like it -- along with all of his friends, or something like that. You might check with him. I'm sure there are others. It's a difficult film from a difficult book. (Although it's the least difficult of McCarthy's novels, IMO.) | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.145.131.242 |
I've heard very mixed things. A key issue people have is that it literally stops feeling like a pure all-out instant classic about two thirds in and turns actually just plain bad. | ||
| Laird Barron (Laird) Username: Laird Registered: 05-2008 Posted From: 71.212.78.124 |
Frankly, polarized reactions reliably indicate high quality artistry. Mediocrity is the worst sin, and mediocrity doesn't attract controversy. I don't know that it ranks as a classic, but I greatly enjoyed the film -- from the visceral to technical aspects of plot and execution. It's faithful to the book and McCarthy's work sometimes takes a 180 degree turn from reader expectation, which tends to incense a certain segment of the audience. I sympathize with what amounts to unconventional artistic choices. Bad? That's a difficult evaluation for me to accept. I have noted with Mccarthy's ascent into pop culture, his detractors have expectedly multiplied due to the author's exposure, but criticism has intensified as well. Another consequence of critical combinbed with commercial success, I think. My view from across the aisle. ;) | ||
| Laird Barron (Laird) Username: Laird Registered: 05-2008 Posted From: 71.212.78.124 |
Edit: I sympathize with negative reactions to what amounts to unconventional artistic choices. | ||
| John_l_probert (John_l_probert) Username: John_l_probert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 90.203.130.117 |
"Frankly, polarized reactions reliably indicate high quality artistry. Mediocrity is the worst sin, and mediocrity doesn't attract controversy." I think you're absolutely right there, Laird. A film that everyone seemed to like except me was 'There Will be Blood', but I didn't think it was mediocre - just very very annoying. I also remember as a kid reading awful reviews of films I loved, and while it was kind of upsetting to see stuff I really liked being trashed it made me think that if people ever trashed anything I did it wouldn't matter because material I loved and respected had been subjected to the same sort of treatment, and if I could be on a par with those then I would be very happy. There must have been a shorter way of saying that | ||
| Laird Barron (Laird) Username: Laird Registered: 05-2008 Posted From: 71.212.78.124 |
John: I respect your philosophy. As far as shrugging off criticism goes -- my collection received a negative review in the NY Times. The reviewer praised my craftsmanship and panned my choice of subject matter. Not a a very defensible criteria for serious evaluation, but there you go. I'll take anythng from the NY times because my book sold out directly after. A couple of weeks ago I was browsing the NY Times review archives and came across a review of a Peter Straub collection; a successful and otherwise critically acclaimed collection, by the way. The reviewer blithely whipped Straub like a rented mule. And it made me feel a whole lot better! | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.249.146 |
"Frankly, polarized reactions reliably indicate high quality artistry. Mediocrity is the worst sin, and mediocrity doesn't attract controversy." Amen to that. | ||
| Karim Ghahwagi (Karim) Username: Karim Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 83.92.216.182 |
I agree with that as well. Regarding 'There Will Be Blood' and 'No Country'- as mentioned elsewhere on the board- I thought both films were excellent. Still I have to admit that I didn't think the academy would award them with the Oscars they did. I can see how There Will Be Blood could seem annoying to some, but the performance by Lewis was just so overwhelming. Regarding literary reviews in the NY Times- strange beast that- For example: A reviewer recently started his write up on a children's fantasy book (no need to mention the title folks) with ' I don't usually read this sort of thing but...' Why the hell are you reviewing it then. That strikes me as quite odd. A work should of course stand on its own and you don't need to be well read in a particular genre to review it, but they could atleast assign the review to someone who has an interest in the genre IMHO | ||
| John_l_probert (John_l_probert) Username: John_l_probert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 90.208.214.4 |
Laird - If your book sold out then you're winning as far as I'm concerned. I bought the trade hardcover of 'The Imago Sequence' by the way and it's very nice - I particularly like the design etched into the boards. Karim - I thought Day-Lewis' performance in 'There Will Be Blood' was terrific, what annoyed me was that the rest of it felt so insubstantial and such a waste of time that I was sorely disappointed. Sergio Leone would have given it so much more heart and made it a genuine epic. | ||
| Karim Ghahwagi (Karim) Username: Karim Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 83.92.216.182 |
Right John I can see how the whole movie does feel like it is there to highlight the central performance. I guess I was sold on that quiet opening, the long shot of the car, also when they strike oil and finally the scene when Lewis is swimming with his so-called brother. I have to admit that those moments struck me as powerful sequences belonging to the silent cinema. The point about Sergio Leone is valid indeed. I did also feel that the choice of Greenwood as composer helped the emotional apocalyptic feel to great effect quite often in the picture. | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.249.146 |
>>Sergio Leone would have given it so much more heart and made it a genuine epic.<< Reasons to love Lord probert #~721. :-) I must admit, I expect to love both There Will Be Blood and No Country... I'm a huge fan of DD Lewis, the Cohens, Paul Thomas Anderson (thought Magnolia was a masterpiece) and Josh brolin. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.24.122.40 |
>>>"Frankly, polarized reactions reliably indicate high quality artistry. Mediocrity is the worst sin, and mediocrity doesn't attract controversy." Indeed. Just look at the Amazon reviews of THE GRIN OF THE DARK. Or any reviews of anything Martin Amis writes. | ||
| Karim Ghahwagi (Karim) Username: Karim Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 83.92.216.182 |
Whats with you and Martin Amis Gary? ;-) | ||
| Mark_lynch (Mark_lynch) Username: Mark_lynch Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 212.74.96.200 |
They play darts together, innit. I really enjoyed the movie of NO COUNTRY. I Suspect a lot of people disliked it because of the last scene, which is the whole point of the movie. Ah well... Maybe I liked it because I was hoping for that scene, having read the book already. I'd feared a more pyrotechnic ending. | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 75.4.226.77 |
Tru dat, Chris: I didn't like NCFOM, and no one I know liked it (much like the reaction I'm getting from others on the new Indiana Jones movie). In sum: film has its own requirements, those needing to be satisfied for a satisfactory viewing experience. This one flouted those requirements. And therefore, it was an unsatisfying viewing experience. It had wonderful sequences, rich characters, great dialogue, good cinematography, etc. But, in the end, NCFOM proved to be an unsatisfying viewing experience. Unlike, TRANSFORMERS....  | ||
| Laird Barron (Laird) Username: Laird Registered: 05-2008 Posted From: 71.212.78.124 |
"This one flouted those requirements." Which ones? If don't mind indulging the curious.... | ||
| Huw (Huw) Username: Huw Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 61.216.37.237 |
Transformers was typical Hollywood disposable popcorn fare. Craig, a 'satisfactory viewing experience' depends as much upon the viewer as the movie. I don't care about all these notions of rules and formulas - either something moves me and holds my attention in some way, or it doesn't. I don't sit in front of the screen calculating whether the film is violating some theoretical filmmakers' handbook. Of course, there are common elements that most, if not all, stories share (whatever the medium); but there's no strict rulebook, as far as I'm concerned. | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 75.5.6.227 |
Here we go again....  Neither do I, at all, "sit in front of the screen calculating whether the film is violating some theoretical filmmakers' handbook." In fact, that formula would wholly support NCFOM, since most theoreticians of film (makers and otherwise) are effete elitist post-structuralists, to simply and unfairly disparge them all at once. Going to the point as succintly as I can, and answering Laird: NCFOM had the trajectory of a neo-noir, but then went off the rails at the end. The "hero" (Brolin) is killed at the end, O.S. (confusingly); Jones' role seems to have no relevance to the plot, you could remove him and leave the story unaffected; Bardem's coda is mystifyingly dull, or dully mystifying, take your pick; and then there's the confusions - why did the cop arrest Bardem at the opening? Why did Bardem allow himself to be arrested? Was Bardem in the room when Jones showed up, or what? and so on. Remember "Duck Duck Goose"? Well, here it's - noir, noir, noir, noir, noir, noir, noir... vexatiously-confusing pretentious art film!  (And anyone who makes the lame-brained excuse "So was the novel," please - films and novels are separate entities, both have their own requirements, etc. "The book was like that," would suddenly resurrect a whole host of shitty films, and I know we all don't want that....) | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.249.146 |
"noir, noir, noir, noir, noir, noir, noir... vexatiously-confusing pretentious art film!" Sounds great to me. :-) I think the Cohens are a love-them-or-hate-them kind of team. All their films do odd things with genre and cinema and narrative conventions, and I'm always suprised when a mainstream audience warms to them. Personally, I love their films and can't wait to see this. | ||
| Huw (Huw) Username: Huw Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 61.216.37.237 |
The Coens, even. ;-) Craig, you just gave away a huge spoiler! I haven't even seen the film yet...  | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 75.4.227.76 |
?!?!? - I assumed everyone on this thread had seen it, especially you HUW, who in your last post seemed to imply you had.... My bad. But if your feeling about films proves the same as, literally, everyone I know, then you too will feel how they did: a total and complete letdown at the end. Maybe this letdown will be lessened by knowing in advance how truly disappointing it is.... | ||
| Laird Barron (Laird) Username: Laird Registered: 05-2008 Posted From: 71.212.78.124 |
Craig "But if your feeling about films proves the same as, literally, everyone I know, then you too will feel how they did: a total and complete letdown at the end." I don't think the film would've been so critically and commercially successful if that proved the popular consensus. ;) Thanks for clarifying what you found weak. I can see where you're coming from, although considering you gave the movie high marks in most areas it reinforces what I said up top: defiance of formula isn't demonstrably a design flaw. It does however invite wrath. When one takes a swig of what they think is fruit juice and gets a mouthful of eggnog, one has a tendency to by chagrined. However, the experience of disappointment doesn't speak to the quality of the nog. Another observation -- if you removed Tommy Lee's character you would gut the movie of its underpinnings and leave a hollow and typical action flick, albeit a pretty one. The story concerns much more than the bang-bang surface plot. McCarthy's a moralizer and his philosophizing as communicated through Jones is the engine that drives the vehicle. Considering I've spent many a year slaving away in the blue collar pits, I can't agree multilayered and unconventional storytelling is the province of the effete elite, whoever those people are.... | ||
| Allybird (Allybird) Username: Allybird Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 79.78.72.96 |
If anyone makes The Road - It had better be faithful to the book. | ||
| Laird Barron (Laird) Username: Laird Registered: 05-2008 Posted From: 71.212.78.124 |
I hear Blood Meridian will be made soon. And, yeah, if they aren't faithful it's pointless. | ||
| Mick Curtis (Mick) Username: Mick Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.159.143.179 |
If anyone makes The Road - It had better be faithful to the book. It's being made now, Ally... http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0898367/ | ||
| Huw (Huw) Username: Huw Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 218.168.190.157 |
Craig, no worries. I should have stayed clear of this thread until I'd seen the movie, but I had a peek and then I started getting caught up in the discussion. ;-) | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 83.98.9.4 |
So according to Craig, if you start a film as say, a screwball comedy then 45 minutes into it, suddenly switch the film into a terrifyng horror story and end the film an hour and a bit later with the characters simply leaving their temporary shelter and driving off into the unknown whilst still surrounded by the danger, this would be an unforgivable sin in film making terms. Or if you started off with a jailbreak and hostage situation, then about 45 minutes in again, let all the characters walk into a a room full of vampires and the rest of the film is an all out battle with said vamps, that is also unforgivable. The first film is Hitchcocks the Birds, the second is Dusk till dawn. There are too many exceptions to these rules you keep quoting for the rules to be true. NCFOM was a great film. One which I intend to see again. Does anyone agree with me that that boy at the end had the biggest nipples ever seen... | ||
| Joel (Joel) Username: Joel Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.156.110.243 |
Too many film viewers expect to be 'satisfied' rather in the way that they expect to 'know what they're watching': if a film bothers, provokes, disturbs or confuses them, it has failed. As Ramsey said years ago, the cinema should pamper your arse, not your mind. Can I add my voice to those praising both NOP COUNTRY FOR OLD MEN and THERE WILL BE BLOOD? It's great to see mainstream cinema daring to adapt serious novels without dumbing them down to suit a marketing executive's notion of 'the movie audience'. | ||
| Michael_kelly (Michael_kelly) Username: Michael_kelly Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 207.188.64.106 |
Laird, I think we'd all take a negative review in the NY Times. We'd prefer a positive one, of course. ;-) | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 75.5.8.244 |
Weber, mmm... the thing with NCFOM, is that it's not 45 minutes it, but more like 1.5 hours in. And DUSK TILL DAWN is hardly a great and flawless example; besides, I have said before, I maintain the radical aesthetic stance (these elite effetes are so making me yawn...) that extra-material factors are valid in judging a given artistic work: advertising for a film, say, is valid evidence to use in judging the work in question, because it's part of the created film entity itself (unlike the novel it's based on, say, which predates plans to create the film). We all knew DTD was going to be a vampire-fest, going in, only an idiot didn't. All I said was, NCFOM didn't satisfy me, ultimately. Or did it, but I didn't know it? Joel, a simple question - what constitutes failure in a film for you? Use non-subjective criteria to form the basis of your answer.  Btw, I adored THERE WILL BE BLOOD. If it happened to be true to the source material, well, so much the more joy for that. | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.145.131.242 |
I've been thinking of faithful productions; Psycho and Frankenstein are the two that strike me as being the best to really play with their originals and develop them in different directions. Not many people love that but I feel we are more enriched for having both, as are the tales. | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 83.98.9.4 |
"Weber, mmm... the thing with NCFOM, is that it's not 45 minutes it, but more like 1.5 hours in. And DUSK TILL DAWN is hardly a great and flawless example; besides, I have said before, I maintain the radical aesthetic stance (these elite effetes are so making me yawn...) that extra-material factors are valid in judging a given artistic work: advertising for a film, say, is valid evidence to use in judging the work in question, because it's part of the created film entity itself (unlike the novel it's based on, say, which predates plans to create the film). We all knew DTD was going to be a vampire-fest, going in, only an idiot didn't. All I said was, NCFOM didn't satisfy me, ultimately. Or did it, but I didn't know it? " But you must agree with me about that boys nipples!!! | ||
| Joel (Joel) Username: Joel Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.156.110.243 |
Tony, surely the film of PSYCHO is about as close to the novel as it could be. Making Norman Bates young and thin rather than forty and fat is the only major difference. Hitchcock himself said: "Everything in PSYCHO came from Robert Bloch's novel." A generation of film critics have denigrated Bloch's novel in order to make inflated claims for Hitchcock's creativity. It's a good film (albeit flawed), but those (and I'm not suggesting you're one of them) who claim Hitchcock made a silk purse out of the sow's ear of the novel make me very angry. So angry I could just... never mind. | ||
| Joel (Joel) Username: Joel Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.156.110.243 |
Weber, it depends what kind of failure you mean. A film can succeed in targeting its market and satisfying audience expectations without actually having any integrity or originality. I can't offer 'non-subjective' criteria of quality because aesthetics cannot be quantified, unlike profit margins. Aesthetic criteria are 'intersubjective', in a word coined by some philosopher or other (Gary may be able to tell me who): they depend on subjective values that can be agreed between people and augmented with knowledge and experience. To my mind, a film can have significant technical failings and still be good – meaningful, original, thought-provoking, truthful – while a film can be technically accomplished and still be essentially trite, stupid, exploitative nonsense. Fulci's THE BEYOND is hugely flawed, but it's still a good film at heart. Argento's SUSPIRIA is technically quite excellent, but it's still shit: its premise, ethos and aesthetic are all shit. | ||
| Laird Barron (Laird) Username: Laird Registered: 05-2008 Posted From: 71.212.78.124 |
"It's a good film (albeit flawed), but those (and I'm not suggesting you're one of them) who claim Hitchcock made a silk purse out of the sow's ear of the novel make me very angry. So angry I could just..." ...Transmogrify into a gigantic green humanoid and destroy government property by the hundreds and millions of dollars/pounds? ;) | ||
| Huw (Huw) Username: Huw Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 61.216.32.121 |
Why do you think that The Beyond is more worthy than Suspiria, Joel? People are brutally killed in outlandish ways in both films. Is it because most of them are women in Argento's film, and does that make a difference? They're all people. I'm not sure I understand your last statement. The premise of Suspiria is very simple - it's basically a nightmarish fairytale. I'm not sure if it has an 'ethos' or not. As for the aesthetics: they are surely one of the film's strong points? | ||
| Joel (Joel) Username: Joel Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.156.110.243 |
THE BEYOND is, to me, essentially a film about the afterlife and the horror of mortality. SUSPIRIA is a cleverly marketed blend of sadism and misogyny. Premise: witches (pagans) are evil and deserve a violent death. Ethos: women are either attractive (knife fodder) or evil (fire fodder). Aesthetic: a pretty girl looks at her best with her throat cut. | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 213.219.8.243 |
Argento's film is a highly fetishised nightmare; I can see why people have problems with it (indeed with much of his work), but I must admit I find it all to silly to be offended. Also, at his best, he was a great visual stylist. Sadly, whatever he once had is long gone. The style has been consumed by the daftness. I'll always go with Fulci, though. His nightmares had an edge, a surreal aspect that is still genuinely unnerving and much of his work gives the OTT violence a sort of unreal sense. I also think Fulci was simply more intelligent a filmmaker than Argento. The latter could never have made a film like The Beyond; or one like The Gates of Hell/City of the Living Dead. | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 75.4.242.121 |
Aesthetic criteria are 'intersubjective', in a word coined by some philosopher or other... they depend on subjective values that can be agreed between people and augmented with knowledge and experience. And this brings me back to my central point about NCFOM: it violated an "agreed" aesthetic rule, which is, don't spin a particular genre/storyline with its own expectations in place; then, not just violate, but trounce all those threads and expectations, and expect a satisfying experience from the viewer. ... but I'll admit to being of mixed mind on this for a simple reason: great art is achieved exactly by those very artists who do betimes trounce forms and conventions. But not all trouncing is created equal - some trouncings are more equal than other trouncings.... | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 83.98.9.4 |
And there was the boy at the end - Nipples like pygmy's cocks!! That's what he had - nipples like pygmy's cocks! | ||
| Griff (Griff) Username: Griff Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 92.17.91.41 |
You been reading Rogers Profanisaurus again, Weber? | ||
| John_l_probert (John_l_probert) Username: John_l_probert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 90.203.130.36 |
"I'll always go with Fulci, though" Absolutely. I have no serious objection to Suspiria, but all of Argento's movies at their best have a kind of showy technique to them that reminds you you are watching a film. With Fulci you're in the film - weird, fucked up film that it might be. Almost as if Argento is showing you a beautifully framed picture of an abattoir or madhouse whereas Fulci has grabbed your hand and pulled you right in there and is doing his best to rub your face in it. | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.145.131.242 |
Joel - yes, Psycho not a good example. Maybe 39 Steps - but then both are excellent in that case. But then Psycho really did feel different with that cast tweak; I think the film choice was better, and yes, the book was pretty good (though if I remember right did it not clue you in to Norman's pecadillos early on? That felt like a misstep to me, too, if I remember right.) | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 75.16.86.206 |
I love Fulci to death, but let's not forget Fulci's slide into Argento-esque shit-films as well.... Those poor children in Argento films - how did they ever grow up normal? Or did they? Grow up, I mean.... "Bob! Bob! Bob!" | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.145.131.242 |
Looking at my post I seem to have the onset of alzheimers... | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.145.131.242 |
http://uk.images.search.yahoo.com/images/view?back=http%3A%2F%2Fuk.images.search .yahoo.com%2Fsearch%2Fimages%3Fp%3Dno%2Bcountry%2Bfor%2Bold%2Bmen%26ni%3D18%26ei %3DUTF-8%26y%3DSearch%26fr%3Dbt-portal%26xargs%3D0%26pstart%3D1%26b%3D55&w=366&h =500&imgurl=static.flickr.com%2F2320%2F2330471903_eb43ae73fa.jpg&rurl=http%3A%2F %I like this cover btw 2Fwww.flickr.com%2Fphotos%2Fsick-girl%2F2330471903%2F&size=90.7kB&name=No%20countr y%20for%20old%20men&p=no%20country%20for%20old%20men&type=JPG&oid=9282f492c03c6e 28&fusr=Sick-Girl&tit=No%20country%20for%20old%20men&hurl=http://www.flickr.com/ photos/sick-girl/&no=56&tt=3,156 | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.145.131.242 |
Oh, ignore it. | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.145.131.242 |
There; http://www.flickr.com/photos/sick-girl/2330471903/ | ||
| Allybird (Allybird) Username: Allybird Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 79.78.0.74 |
I'm looking forward to when they film The Road. Mind you I'll probably see it two years after everyone else :>) No babysitter - so will wait for the DVD. | ||
| Ramsey Campbell (Ramsey) Username: Ramsey Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 195.93.21.100 |
'Tony, surely the film of PSYCHO is about as close to the novel as it could be. Making Norman Bates young and thin rather than forty and fat is the only major difference. Hitchcock himself said: "Everything in PSYCHO came from Robert Bloch's novel."' Well, not nearly quite. I should mention that Bob Bloch told me he thought that change in Norman Bates worked well. But the structural change - making the first three (I think) chapters into the first third of the film gives the whole thing a completely different weight. I think we're talking about a good novel and a great or certainly near-great film. I've read the book twice and watched the film seven or eight times, and that rather signifies how much more I think can be found in each of them on reacquaintance. | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.145.131.242 |
Ramsey - did Bob ever mention Hitch? What a friendship you had there, I must say. | ||
| Joel (Joel) Username: Joel Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 91.110.246.27 |
Tony, in his autobiography ONCE AROUND THE BLOCH, Bloch says: "Many people have asked me who Hitchcock was. I don't know who he was, but I know who he wasn't. He wasn't a man anyone would ever call 'Al'." | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.145.131.242 |
I remember that story about the time Paul Newman went to visit him and started rooting round in his fridge for a beer without asking. This appalled Hitch. It would have me, too! | ||
| Joel (Joel) Username: Joel Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.156.110.243 |
Ramsey – in spite of giving Marion Crane a much longer section of the narrative, Hitchcock left out the crucial detail that the man she robbed had previously offered her money for sex. That suggests, to me, that he was more concerned with having the opportunity to show her putting her clothes on after sex than with making sense of her motives and character. The film has some very fine aspects – most notably, for me, the scene where Norman cleans up the bathroom, as well as the stunning realisation of Mrs Bates' time-capsule room. It's fantastic on physical geography. But it takes minimal trouble over character motivation, and Norman Bates is rendered less accessible in order to deliver all of the insights at once in an extended final explanation. | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 83.98.9.4 |
"You been reading Rogers Profanisaurus again, Weber?" Is that where that quote comes from? Thanx. I heard someone use it a long time back - thought it was about as subtle as a sledgehammer in the face wrapped in tinsel and christmas paper, but bloody funny. I had no idea where it came from. Re Psycho - this is allegedly the first hollywood movie where a toilet was flushed on screen. Don't know how true that is but it sounds convincing. | ||
| Chris_morris (Chris_morris) Username: Chris_morris Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 12.165.240.116 |
Showing Crane dressing after sex and impulsively stealing money suggests only that she wasn't Polly Pureheart. Her motivations for stealing the money are ambiguous, but they're not difficult to imagine. Perhaps Hitch felt that painting Marion Crane in shades of grey would make easier the viewer's transition of empathy from Crane to Norman Bates halfway through the film. Nonetheless, I never felt that Crane needed additional motivation for her crime, and I'm not sure that adding such motivation would have helped the film in any way. I should note, though, that I've never read the book. I think the movie's terrific, though. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.24.122.40 |
"We all go a little mad sometimes." The shrink's explanation at the end always struck me as an example of Hitch poking his tongue firmly in his cheek. Can't the film on one level be regarded as an example of what's known now as the 'death of motivation'? What is it Amis says: motivation is pretty shagged out as an element of fiction. | ||
| Joel (Joel) Username: Joel Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 91.110.229.139 |
Gary – no, that interpretation doesn't work given how profoundly Freudian the whole narrative is. The whole point is that irrational acts have motives, however warped or hidden they may be. I agree with Amis's statement if he's talking about rational, means to an end motives, as he may well be. Such motives usually conceal irrational, less simple motives. But the idea that people just do things for no reason at all waves goodbye to all of the insights that Freud gave us and puts us in a world of the random and mechanical – which may please postmodernists and politicians, but is culturally worse than useless. Bloch was a deeply Freudian writer, all the more so as he looked beyond adult sexual desire to the distorted world of non-functional infantile sexuality – the mark of someone who understands Freud. In PSYCHO the novel, the fact that Marion Crane's act is driven by an irrational motive – revenge for a psychosexual injury – links to what we eventually learn about Norman Bates. And if we believe that Bates does what he does for no reason, purely because he is a 'psycho', then we are in the world of Jason Voorhees. And the world of John Major: "condemn more and understand less". "Understand less" often seems to be the motto of modern horror fiction, and it needs to be resisted by all means possible. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.24.122.40 |
What Amis is saying is not that behaviour has no motivation, but that even the most insightful novelist can never truly fully understand it, and that - as Hardy said - any fictional character is merely a 'bag of bones' compared to a real person. Now, I actually take issue with that: a map may not be the territory, but at least it's a form of guidance. However, with regard to Psycho, I have to add that I think the 'explanation' at the end is a bit limp. Still, this is fiction, so it's okay, even if the author is essentially subscribing wholesale to a theoretical perspective, and can - Godlike - control all the dynamics of her/his tale in order to confirm it. So in that sense, I have more problems with theory-confirmation pieces of non-fiction such as SYBIL. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.24.122.40 |
Remember that Buffy-conference I once mentioned to you, Joel? At Huddersfield University? Well, I didn't go, but I had a sneak preview of one of the papers, and the author was using a Sartrian analysis of the interaction between the humans and humans, vamps and vamps, and then the vamps and humans. In this latter group, the author suggested was the conflict that Sartre identified - the fight for recognition, mutual identification, etc. Now one of the issues that came from this was whether the authors of the show were informed by Sartrian ideas. If they were, the critic said, then isn't Buffy merely an exercise in theory-confirmation? Isn't fiction driven by any theoretical perspective always going to be ripe for an interpretation based on that very point of view? No such thing as a cultural vacuum, came the rebuttal. ALL fiction is driven by some assumptions. Then it all got postmodern. :<) But the point remains: if an author subscribes to a specific theoretical perspective, isn't the fiction going to reflect that? I read a fascinating analysis of the nascent psychoanalytic assumptions in The Shining, how Jack functioned like Freud's hydraulic model of the psyche, how he was 'triggered' into action, etc. King's narrative is shot through with Freudian ontological assumptions, many of which has been problematised by subsequent theorising. | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 75.5.7.229 |
Freud's is an elaborate myth-structure - a *theory* - that has become so ubiquitous, so totally absorbed within us practically since birth, we can non longer imagine an outside to it. The unconscious, sub-conscious, etc., are all tropes of one sort or another. One of his most famous "psychoanalyses" is that of Hamlet: a wholly fabricated construct, that was probably based more on stageplay-structure "motivations," than flesh-and-blood ones. Sometimes people do simply go mad. Children fall down and hit their heads, something breaks inside their skulls, and they snap forever. There is evil in the world so utterly vile and monstrous - e.g., Albert Fish - that any kind of psychoanalyzing is superfluous. Any kind of thirst for "motivation," is a story-structural thirst. And, against what I admit is a justified yearning in the reader/viewer, leaving such motivations hanging, in the right way, can often and actually I think enrich a work of art. I admire the fact that NCFOM didn't "explain" Chigurgh. I just saw the not-too-good indie-dramedy LARS AND THE REAL GIRL, and one thing I liked was that it too didn't at all attempt to "explain" Lars' delusion... which, in retrospect, lended a profoundly unsettling flavor to the film.... | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.24.122.40 |
Well, as I said above, none of us can write in a cultural vacuum. We all come at fiction from a theoretical perspective, whether this is born of a close reading of certain thinkers or developed organically from lived experience or (preferably) both. Still, I agree with Joel in the sense that (some) fiction should seek to examine life - provide a 'map' for guidance which can be set against the 'territory' in terms of the degree to which it illuminates. I also agree that sometimes, when the context demands it, it's often crucial to remember that there are no pat answers, and that a refusal to provide them can well be legitimate. Again, it's a case of not being prescriptive. I still think Hitch has his tongue in his cheek at the end of Psycho, though. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.24.122.40 |
I have much time for Freud (and more for his followers), but his theory is shot through with ontological assumptions which are historically situated: namely, the hydraulic model of the psyche which he naturally took from his 'industrial' age. I think this model is appealing because it's mechanistic: King clearly was attracted to that in The Shining. The whole book is a symphony of such processes - the bees' nest as the subconscious mind; the boiler in the hotel as Jack's familially-perverted id; the temporary lack of any superego born of the Torrances' social isolation. Great metaphors for the psyche, but metaphors all the same. A perfect example of a *theory* lurking within a novelist's perspective. Still, how could it ever be otherwise? | ||
| Laird Barron (Laird) Username: Laird Registered: 05-2008 Posted From: 71.212.78.124 |
"There is evil in the world so utterly vile and monstrous - e.g., Albert Fish - that any kind of psychoanalyzing is superfluous." Yes. In such cases. I think there are those who go on two legs but have as much humanity to analyze as you might find in a shark, a reptile. The Bundy's and Dahmers are mimics, imposters. | ||
| Chris_morris (Chris_morris) Username: Chris_morris Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 12.165.240.116 |
Not true. My grandfather was an acquaintance of Fish's. I'm told he found Fish "a lively man," "full of amusing tales," who had a "contagious laugh." He once told my father: "That Fish was a sonofabitch, but he could always put a smile on my face." That's a joke, by the way. | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.249.146 |
:-) It made me laugh. | ||
| Karim Ghahwagi (Karim) Username: Karim Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 83.92.216.182 |
Ha! | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.249.146 |
I received a DVD of No Country For Old Men today (along with my remastered Godfather trilogy box set). I'll watch it over the weekend and post my comments here. Can't wait! | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.249.146 |
Just watched the film and I thought it was absolutely stunning. Maybe even a masterpiece. ~~~~SPOILERS~~~~ The whole thing, to me, seemed to be about chance - the repeated emblem of flipping a coin; the way the plot was basically driven by happenstance; Brolin's fluke (and oddly moving, despite ocurring offscreen) demise; the constant anecdotes regarding people's unexpected and ironic deaths. Craig said: Going to the point as succintly as I can, and answering Laird: NCFOM had the trajectory of a neo-noir, but then went off the rails at the end. I couldn't disagree more. The brilliant end scenes reinforced the themes, and the trajectory of the film was always too off-kilter to be standard neo-noir. From the opening scenes we can see that this is an ambitious film; a film straining at the leash of genre. I always expected to like this film, I just didn't expect to love it as much as I did. I wish all films were as tricky, intelligent and exciting as this. | ||
| Mick Curtis (Mick) Username: Mick Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.159.153.186 |
Knew you'd love it, Zed! | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.249.146 |
It blew me away, Mick. I love films that take you where you don't expect, and this one did exactly that. And I fucking love the Cohens... :-) My favourite Cohen films so far: Barton Fink The Man Who Wasn't There No Country for Old Men | ||
| Huw (Huw) Username: Huw Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 218.168.183.112 |
It's the Coens! Coens, I say!! ;-) Glad you liked it - I'm hoping to see it soon. | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 75.4.253.45 |
I am mystified, Zed... I guess, beauty truly is in the eye of the beholder (Monster Manual, TSR Publications, 1981, pg. 43).  And I even disagree on your choices: didn't like BARTON FINK; so didn't like THE MAN WHO WASN'T THERE, that I actually forgot it even existed, thanks a lot for reminding me of that one, Zed....  But, I will say, I did greatly enjoy these Coen brother movies: THE BIG LEBOWSKI RAISING ARIZONA BLOOD SIMPLE FARGO (of course) (and, most of all) MILLER'S CROSSING | ||
| Laird Barron (Laird) Username: Laird Registered: 05-2008 Posted From: 71.212.78.124 |
Miller's Crossing is one of my favorite films. "Look in your heart! Look in your heart!" | ||
| Ramsey Campbell (Ramsey) Username: Ramsey Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 195.93.21.100 |
I'm still holding out for O Brother Where Art Thou? as their most sheerly enjoyable film. I certainly like Miller's Crossing, but in some ways Heisler's film gets closer to the moral ambiguity of the characters. Yes, it's a remake! | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.249.146 |
Craig - you and I obviously don't see eye-to-eye where film is concerned. I knew you wouldn't like Barton Fink: one part meditation on the nature of art and creativity, one part comedy, one part old-dark-house horror film. It's one of my favourite films ever. The CoHens (sorry Huw!)are terrific: genuine artists, subverting Hollywood convention yet still managing to use the system to their advantage. Even their most commercial or conventional films do strange and wonderful things. | ||
| Mick Curtis (Mick) Username: Mick Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.159.153.186 |
I find it hard to pick a favourite Coen movie. I don't like RAISING ARIZONA or THE LADYKILLERS, but I love FARGO, NCFOM, O BROTHER..., BARTON FINK and a few others - even, in the right mood, THE HUDSUCKER PROXY. | ||
| Karim Ghahwagi (Karim) Username: Karim Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 85.82.192.98 |
Cool to hear you also liked it Zed. Those images of Bardem and the cattlle prod and his haircut, all that is almost as iconic as some of the images from Taxi Driver IMHO. The scene with the coin toss also makes the blood run cold. There are a couple of stills out with Viggo Mortensen from 'The Road' by the way. We'll see. | ||
| Mick Curtis (Mick) Username: Mick Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.159.153.186 |
The scene with the coin toss also makes the blood run cold. Yep - that was the first scene I saw from the film, as it got played on tv quite a lot - chilling stuff. | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.249.146 |
"Call it, Friendo." Iconic as anything I've ever seen. The more I think about this the better is becomes. A marvellous film; God bless the Coens for the risks they take. | ||
| Chris_morris (Chris_morris) Username: Chris_morris Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 98.220.71.248 |
>> I certainly like Miller's Crossing, but in some ways Heisler's film gets closer to the moral ambiguity of the characters. Yes, it's a remake! Ramsey, from what I've read about the Coens, Miller's Crossing isn't exactly a remake. (I assume you're thinking of the original Glass Key?) Heisler's film was based on Dashiell Hammett's classic novel; the Coens were only trying to make a film with a "Hammett" feel to it. Sure, they cribbed some ideas from Hammett's novel (and some from Heisler's interpretation of it), but there are many differences as well. The finished product is probably half-Coen Brothers and half-Hammett. It's also 100% terrific, if you ask me. The Coens have always been forthcoming about the influence of classic American crime novels on their work. Miller's Crossing was their Hammett film, and Blood Simple was their James M. Cain. Their Raymond Chandler, oddly enough, was The Big Lebowski. (They claimed that unnecessarily complicated plots were Chandler's calling card. Ethan Coen: "We wanted to do a Chandler kind of story - how it moves episodically, and deals with the characters trying to unravel a mystery. As well as having a hopelessly complex plot that's ultimately unimportant.") My personal faves are No Country for Old Men, Barton Fink, Miller's Crossing, and Lebowski. My least favorite? (Not that anyone asked.) The Man Who Wasn't There (not a terrible film; it just doesn't have the usual Coen Brothers' spark of life) and O Brother (again, not terrible; it just always seemed to me like an hour of music videos and a half hour of (rather pedestrian) Coen Brothers escapades). But, of course, to each his own. | ||
| Chris_morris (Chris_morris) Username: Chris_morris Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 98.220.71.248 |
By the way, speaking of the Coens, the trailer for their next opus is here: http://www.apple.com/trailers/focus_features/burnafterreading/ | ||
| Karim Ghahwagi (Karim) Username: Karim Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 83.92.216.182 |
Craig 'I guess, beauty truly is in the eye of the beholder (Monster Manual, TSR Publications, 1981, pg. 43)' Is that the one where you got the monsters in sort of a folder, you know where you could clip them in- they had holes? The beholder on the cover as well- purple I think. Or maybe I'm mixing it up with another AD&D monster manual? :-) | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 75.4.231.133 |
It was a hardcover publication, and yes, I think it did have the purple beholder on the cover... I sorta fibbed the actual page ref, it was part of my lame-ass joke... I used to own one, years ago, and have long since lost it... ... come to think of it, that's sorta the color of that beholder.... | ||
| Karim Ghahwagi (Karim) Username: Karim Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 83.92.216.182 |
Ha! yeah it looks like that. It was just a great image you fished out of the vault of the subconcious- the purple AD&D beholder Good flashback mate :-) | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.129.23.231 |
Just watched this the other night. I think it was a really odd case of something being superbly crafted but my not liking it at all or feeling I will ever need to watch it again. I agree with all everyone has said about it's qualities but was unmoved by it. Someone mentioned it lacking heart, and maybe that was it. It's a thing often directed at the Coens and it counts here again - I can think of no 'warm' film they have made, and like some chap wandering wintry wastes wearing only a tracky top I like a bit of warmth. I think films have to have a bit of these 'soft' things in order to fully engage us, and to drive a film. | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.129.23.231 |
'Hitchcock left out the crucial detail that the man she robbed had previously offered her money for sex. That suggests, to me, that he was more concerned with having the opportunity to show her putting her clothes on after sex than with making sense of her motives and character.' I think what Hitchcock did was give Marion more reason to feel guilty, which adds more tension. | ||
| Mick Curtis (Mick) Username: Mick Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.163.241.252 |
I can think of no 'warm' film they have made Not even FARGO, with the wonderful Marge Gunderson? She was the heart of the movie. THE HUDSUCKER PROXY is also 'warm'. | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.242.126 |
I don't think the Cohens have made a bad film. BARTON FINK is my favourite, but NO COUNTRY FOR OLD MEN is right up there with the best of them. | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.242.126 |
Coens, I mean...why do I always misspell their name? :-/ | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 83.98.9.4 |
Your latent anti-semitism? A crush on someone with the name Cohen? Demonic possesion? |