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grigorss - 2007-11-17 17:45:32
Thanks for the heads up -- I read enough good reviews for this to put it on my "Try and catch it in the theaters" list -- but now I think I'll wait for the DVD -- if then, even; although any perfromance from Phillip Seymour Hoffman is generally worth a look-see. By the way, I saw Michael Clayton based on your reccomendation and thought it was excellent. If you're in the mood for a sort-of-thriller, might I suggest the Bros. Coen latest, No Country for Old Men? *****+
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Paula - 2007-11-17 18:32:59
Grigorss: You should at least Netflix it, because there are boobs.

Oh, awesome, I want to see that new Coen Bro's movie!
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Sharon - 2007-11-17 19:33:01
Speaking of feel-bad movies of the year, I saw "Control" last week after you wrote about it. bleak...haunting. I guess that's the point? The acting was so naked. My only complaint is that I'd like to see more what formed Ian Stewart as an artist, more than a cursory pan of his book collection. Can't quite put my finger on what bothered me about this portrayal of him. Loved the scene in front of the Sex Pistols marquee. Legend has it that almost everyone there that night formed his own band. Can't believe Phillip Seymour Hoffman is in a bad movie, it was bound to happen eventually! Speaking of Albert Finney, catch him in Tom Jones (1963), a faithfully rendered crazy 18th century soap opera, to see him at the peak of his manly powers.
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Paula - 2007-11-17 19:58:52
I can't say that BTDKYD is bad movie per se, just that it didn't do much for me. I haven't read any reviews, but I'm sure someone liked it!
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grigorss - 2007-11-17 20:09:31
Ya' know, if I wanna' see boobs, there are easier -- and more rewarding -- ways of going about it than renting the latest Sidney Lumet film...
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Dan - 2007-11-18 00:07:45
It seems appropriate to mention here that Sidney Lumet is the filmmaker who brought boobs to the American screen, in 1965's The Pawnbroker.
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grigorss - 2007-11-18 03:13:50
Thanks for the elucidation, Dan; didn't realize that Lumet was the first mainstream American director to bring bare bosoms to movie theaters (although I have to add that Russ Meyer was bringing boobs to peep shows and drive-ins as early as 1959) -- by the way, your blog is a really well-written piece of film criticism; makes mine seem like some sort of bizarrely-targeted P.S.A. in comparison...
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Dan - 2007-11-18 09:15:55
Grigorss: thanks! I'll check out your blog: I see that we were both impressed by The Tracey Fragments.

Yeah, nudity skulked around the edges of the American cinema before the 60s; and there are bits of nudity in mainstream films made before 1934. But The Pawnbroker led the charge against the Production Code's restrictions on nudity as the system was loosening up in the 60s.
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Greg - 2007-11-18 13:07:32
Albert Finney's Eyebrows would make a great band name or album title.
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Sharon - 2007-11-18 20:34:56
A trivia question for you cineastes: If you saw "Control" recently, what strange, independent film was the protagonist watching on TV toward the end of the picture? (It's one of my top 20 favorites - very odd to see it referenced in another film.)
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Sharon - 2007-11-18 20:34:57
A trivia question for you cineastes: If you saw "Control" recently, what strange, independent film was the protagonist watching on TV toward the end of the picture? (It's one of my top 20 favorites - very odd to see it referenced in another film.)
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Bob - 2007-11-19 12:24:01
Sharon, about your "Can't believe" above, are you implying "Boogie Nights" was a good film? Seems if BN was good, that would make the Val Kilmer John Holmes movie great, and I wouldn't go THAT far.
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Mr Lojban - 2007-11-19 12:30:18
I haven't seen Control yet, but I'm gonna go out on a limb here & guess that the movie was Stroszek, by Herzog. It is legend (& perhaps true) that Stroszek was Ian Curtis's favorite movie and that watching it was his final act before his suicide. I got a chance to see it on tv years ago. It is, indeed, a strange film.
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Paula - 2007-11-19 13:54:05
about your "Can't believe" above, are you implying "Boogie Nights" was a good film?

Har. Wasn't he in Scent of a Woman? I hated that movie. He was also in Along Came Polly, but I recall that he was (as usual) the best thing about that movie, so he gets a pass.
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Sharon - 2007-11-19 14:49:30
Mr. Lojban, Yes, that's it! very impressive. But it confirms my discomfort with this film. My reaction was "Wow! That's Stroszek!" Not, "yes, of course, Ian Curtis as he is shown here would love Stroszek." (By the way, thanks for not ridiculing my obvious lack of band knowledge by referring to him above as Ian Stewart!)In "Control" when asked by his Belgian lover what his favorite film is, he says "The Sound of Music" in an unhipster sincere way. (?) The corny conventional mom side of me wonders why one of my favorite movies, Stoszek, that is, was a favorite of a suicidal rock singer. Hmmm.
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Greg - 2007-11-19 16:13:30
Scent of a Woman was shamefully bad!!! So glad someone agrees. My least favorite movie of all time though is Top Gun. Scent of a Woman is a close second. Both make me want to hang myself. A Few Good Men is right up there also...
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Sharon - 2007-11-19 16:40:15
Miss Paula,I'm embarrassed to admit that I thought Boogie Nights, while no Seventh Seal or Stroszek, was so subversive, so anti-every-american-movie convention, it's worth seeing. And the acting is superb. Never saw Scent of a Woman. (A good rule of thumb might be: don't see a film with a catchphrase. [hoo-ahh])I don't see a lot of popular movies, so I shouldn't have made such a blanket declaration about PSHoffman!
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Bob - 2007-11-20 02:18:51
Don't be embarrassed to admit you were able to enjoy something, Sharon. Then again, I'm not embarrassed to admit that I think that, tonally, it could have been called "John Holmes: The Musical". But maybe real John Holmes movies ruined it for me, by not being any doofier... and yet, they happened to be considerably less anti-every-american-movie convention than the best porn-with-a-plot?? movies, whose directors' seemed to have had a great time being utterly ridiculous, with no anxiety that their non-sexual touches even mattered.
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Mr Lojban - 2007-11-20 10:58:09
Sharon, I should temper my assertion, as I may be misremembering. The legend is certainly that he was watching Stroszek shortly before he died, and that may or may not be true. The idea that it was his favorite movie may just be my own foggy-headed invention. Sound of Music sounds more plausible to me.

You know what? How awesome is it that Stroszek was on tv in 1980?!
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Paula - 2007-11-20 13:44:24
Miss Paula,I'm embarrassed to admit that I thought Boogie Nights

wait a sec, I have nothing 'gainst BN, I was just amused by Bob's comment. Also--cultural tastes are entirely personal and never need to be justified!
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Sharon - 2007-11-20 18:09:36
Mr. Lojban,..."Stroszek was on TV" When I saw that scene at first, I thought "How unrealistic!!" But then I remembered it was British TV...In 1980, I was living in Munich, and I remember laughing to myself while trying to decide watch on primetime mainstream TV there, "Renaldo and Clara", starring Bob Dylan or a Chaplin film made in the 50s in which he talks. (It was banned in the US for decades.) Maybe it's different now. The choice in Europe now is probably Bones or House, too.
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Sharon - 2007-11-20 18:17:21
oops, typo....while trying to decide WHAT TO watch
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