WHAT FOREIGN FILMS HAVE YOU WATCHED LATELY?

[charliechaplinfan]

Tokyo Story is a lovely movie, I wanted to call the puppy after the daughter in law because her character is caring, loving and devoted, I thought it was a good name for a dog as it's the qualities you'd want to have but it was no go with the kids. There are some other great Ozu movies out there but if you liked Tokyo Story I would recommend Ikiru to you, it's Kurosawa but it's the same time period and deals with an older person and end of life.

[feaito]

Alison I loved the character of the daughter-in-law and the wonderful actress who played her; she was by far the most endearing, sweet character of the film along with the mother... I'll take note of your further recommendations. Having seen this film I guess you have seen its predecessor "of sorts" "Make Way for Tomorrow" Haven't you?...Great, great film by the masterful McCarey.

[charliechaplinfan]

Another fabulous film, I saw Tokyo Story first and really didn't know how Make Way For Tomorrow would ever top it but they aren't the same movie at all, they're both highly watchable and moving. There is a lot of grace in the Japanese film, a grace that comes out time and again in Japanese films, partly why I like them, partly because I think I've only watched the cream of Japanese cinema by concentrating on 4 director, Kurosawa, Ozu, Naruse and Mizoguchi.

[ChiO]

partly because I think I've only watched the cream of Japanese cinema by concentrating on 4 director, Kurosawa, Ozu, Naruse and Mizoguchi.

Boy, ain't that the truth. Like you, I find myself saying I love Japanese film and then rattle off the same four directors. Or French (Renoir, Ophuls, Resnais, Bresson). Or New German (Herzog, Fassbinder, Wenders).

But I'd be prone to giggle if I heard somebody say, "Yes, I love American cinema. I've watched Ford, Welles, Wilder and Hitchcock."

There just isn't enough time (or accessibility), is there, to come close to grasping a national cinema (if there even is such a thing).

[MikeBSG]

I agree that it is hard to go beyond a handful of great directors in any national cinema. Still, I give credit to anyone who doesn't run screaming into the night when the first subtitles show up on the screen.

The important thing (to me) is not to become an inverse snob. "Oh, you think Kurosawa IS Japanese film, do you? You haven't even scratched the surface." Or "Only phoneys think Eisenstein represents Soviet cinema. If you haven't seen "Volga-Volga" (a musical comedy) you shouldn't even talk about Soviet film." I have been on the receiving end of such comments, and it isn't pretty.

[charliechaplinfan]

I have to agree with both of you there. I have watched films by other Japanese directors but their films haven't been as widely released but I'd recommend the films of the 4 directors named for anybody new to foreign cinema. I haven't scratched the surface of German movies yet, or Russian. Still a lot for this girl to learn.

[CineMaven]

My friend and I were walking through Chelsea ( a neighborhood in NY ) and we saw this store:



And it had all these foreign movie posters in the window. Okay okay, all these movies are not foreign...looks like some of these movies played in foreign countries:



The posters had a Giallo feel so they struck my eye and pulled me in.

[Mr. Arkadin]

Some of them are a little hard to see, but I did notice that poster of The Dead are Alive AKA The Etruscan Kills Again (1971) and Barbara Steels' The Ghost:



I'll swap you a few more:

[CineMaven]

Are they hard to see b'cuz ithey're too small? On Photobucket I reduced them to 160pix. I love Jeanne Moreau and Barbara Steele. Dude, don't make me start getting obsessed about collecting Giallo posters.

I'm highly suggestible.

[charliechaplinfan]

Me too, although whims of this kind get killed by my husband.

[Mr. Arkadin]

Are they hard to see b'cuz ithey're too small? On Photobucket I reduced them to 160pix. I love Jeanne Moreau and Barbara Steele. Dude, don't make me start getting obsessed about collecting Giallo posters.

I'm highly suggestible.

On closer look (or squinting really close to the screen), I did see the House of Psychotic Women poster, which is actually better known as The Blue Eyes of the Broken Doll (1973), a Spanish giallo. Here's a bit more info:

http://giallo-fever.blogspot.com/2007/0 ... -blue.html



One of my favorite Steele posters:

[CineMaven]

Beautiful, Mr. A. RED, WHITE and BLUE. It almost looks like an American political poster! ( Big Barbara Steele fan, here. ) I"ll make my posters bigger later tonite. I do not want you squinting.

[JackFavell]

I watched Cocteau's Le Sang d'un Poete (1930) for the first time yesterday and really liked it. I'd already seen Orphee some time ago.

Very hard to put into words what I thought it meant, but I can at least explain how I felt about it. It had narrative titles, but no subs, so any dialogue was lost on me although I have a smattering of french.... I think the narration titles covered most everything anyway.

It's such a specific 'art' film, precisely filled with very dense imagery that is not explained. I let it wash over me, taking what I could from the masklike, dreamy and poetic images. There's no doubt that Cocteau was an original thinker, an artist, very self conscious but also very deep. It's planned to the nth degree, which somehow makes it more incredible as a piece of spontaneous looking art.

The artwork is very beautiful, three dimensional at times and sometimes disturbing. I found it sometimes funny as well. The sculptures and moving parts must have taken a long time to work out and film. My favorite section was tjhe first. It had to do with a very beautiful looking artist, played by Enrique Riveros, his artwork coming to life, beyond his control. The best parts included gorgeous wire heads and partial body sculptures coming to life, slowly, an eye at a time. The being, half inside a wall and half out, sitting on a bed filled with different clothing, with a spinning disc balancing her was probably the most intriguing image in the film, but I found the wire heads to be the most beautiful taken all on their own. I think these related images, and the first one - a mouth wiped off of a painting and then suddenly come to life in the artist's hand - was (simplistically) about art speaking to us. The mouth was then transferred to the artist's statue, which begins to move and speak and come to life. Finally, the artist eats the mouth, internalizing it.

It seemed to me to be about the pain of the artist who wants desperately to get rid of his unwanted, strange gift - the voice that each artist, poet or musician speaks with being out of his control and painful. He cannot help but see and talk about disturbing things that come up from the depths of life and of his soul. The artist/poet travels inwardly, pulling these sights and awarenesses from the deepest part of him, across time, speaking for many who are voiceless. He translates them into art, giving words to voiceless emotions, and meaning to what seem to be meaningless actions.

The film starts to seem rather random, though I think it was not, especially in the mirror section. The artist breaks through a mirror, coming out on the other side, seeing people and their actions behind closed doors in a new way that takes the stigma from some of these events. He spies them through keyholes, watching as a girl is forced to climb up a wall onto a ceiling by a woman, perhaps her mother, who has her in chains and is whipping her. He witnesses other odd things, some of them mundane, some disturbing, through different keyholes, and then is forced to experience his own death by shooting himself in the head. He decides thats enough and yanks himself back through the mirror of his mind, coming from his imagination back to 'reality'.

There are other sections, one about a group of boys who get into a violent snowball fight for fun, ending in the death of a classmate, who, as he dies, a statue nearby crumbles apart. Another section has the mother of the dead boy playing a game of cards over him, while the whole thing is looked on by an audience in a theatre. For me these were less strong sections, but it may be that I just couldn't concentrate deeply through them.

One can't help but be impressed, but the film has a sort of exhausting effect. It definitely makes you think about perceptions, and how the arts change them over time. A very interesting film, I'd like to go back and watch again, to see if any of these thoughts are even remotely the same the second time around.

[CineMaven]

...Dude, don't make me start getting obsessed about collecting Giallo posters. I'm highly suggestible.

Me too, although whims of this kind get killed by my husband.

Ha!!!! Me...I have to rely on my own self-censorship. I fail...miserably.

* * * * *

Wendy, as Bon Jovi ( sort of ) said, you give Artsy a GOOD name! You made what you saw sound very in-ter-es-ting!

* * * * *

Let me try again. I'm hopeful that these 400 x 400 of these posters I saw come out better:

[CineMaven]

Trailer for Wong Kar Wai's upcoming film The Grandmasters."


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