John Crowley's LJ (RSS Feed)
05-29-2008, 07:17 AM
THe last two films I saw probably rather neatly encompass the range of possible worlds in film, ar at least stand at two poles. Both were pretty good.
One was Ironman. Very deft and witty, well put together; funny unexpected lines in the dialogue, some of it ad-libbed I thought. Stark (the self-indulgent millionaire who will reform) seduces the Vanity Fair reporter come to upbraid him for his arms dealing; when his omnicompetent gal Friday asks him why he's late for a meeting, he says "I was doing a piece for Vanity Fair." One odd effect: the film was lovingly furnished with authentic detail, especially in the Mideastern details -- cruel warlords of nameless creed harassing villagers, looking right out of the TV news, and then Ironman arrives to save the innocent ,and the contrast between the villagers so realistically at threat and the bizarrely unreal superhero threw the movie into absurdity, or the wrong kind of absurdity. But a well made picture that the makers of Hollywood golden-age well-made pix can be proud to be the ancestors of.
Next night from Netflix, Goodbye Lenin, a touching and funny German film: a mother of two children, softie son and tough-egg sister both of whom love her, falls into a coma in 1989 and misses the whole collapse of her country, the GDR -- she having been a passionate socialist dogooder. Afraid that the shock of it will kill her, after she wakes the children try to keep her from knowing it's happened, going to greater and greater lengths to keep all knowledge out of her bedroom, including running on a VCR tapes of old GDR newsreels and variety shows ("It was always the same crap, she won't notice"). It works too: they rebuild a false state for one person with the best motives, after the collapse of a real false state that hurt millions. This was a movie like a novel, repetitious rather than dramatic, building effects and characters slowly, the viewer unabe to guess what will come next, no bad guys or good guys. Too repetitious sometimes but a fine dense funny film.
See what I mean?
(Original Post) (http://crowleycrow.livejournal.com/88196.html)
One was Ironman. Very deft and witty, well put together; funny unexpected lines in the dialogue, some of it ad-libbed I thought. Stark (the self-indulgent millionaire who will reform) seduces the Vanity Fair reporter come to upbraid him for his arms dealing; when his omnicompetent gal Friday asks him why he's late for a meeting, he says "I was doing a piece for Vanity Fair." One odd effect: the film was lovingly furnished with authentic detail, especially in the Mideastern details -- cruel warlords of nameless creed harassing villagers, looking right out of the TV news, and then Ironman arrives to save the innocent ,and the contrast between the villagers so realistically at threat and the bizarrely unreal superhero threw the movie into absurdity, or the wrong kind of absurdity. But a well made picture that the makers of Hollywood golden-age well-made pix can be proud to be the ancestors of.
Next night from Netflix, Goodbye Lenin, a touching and funny German film: a mother of two children, softie son and tough-egg sister both of whom love her, falls into a coma in 1989 and misses the whole collapse of her country, the GDR -- she having been a passionate socialist dogooder. Afraid that the shock of it will kill her, after she wakes the children try to keep her from knowing it's happened, going to greater and greater lengths to keep all knowledge out of her bedroom, including running on a VCR tapes of old GDR newsreels and variety shows ("It was always the same crap, she won't notice"). It works too: they rebuild a false state for one person with the best motives, after the collapse of a real false state that hurt millions. This was a movie like a novel, repetitious rather than dramatic, building effects and characters slowly, the viewer unabe to guess what will come next, no bad guys or good guys. Too repetitious sometimes but a fine dense funny film.
See what I mean?
(Original Post) (http://crowleycrow.livejournal.com/88196.html)