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I just watched Blast of Silence and I love how Frank spent the first half just walking around the city being miserable.
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Nov 16, 2017 04:53
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OregonDonor posted:The Long Goodbye is such a gem and it has several conceits that give it its own feel and rhythm. I can't articulate it well but it feels exactly like a noir film that only Robert Altman could ever make (even though its cadence certainly influenced Lebowski, Inherent Vice, and others). The righteous Zen cool that Elliot Gould infuses Philip Marlowe with as a walking anachronism trying to make sense of the consumer sprawl of the 70's is totally inspired and is probably his best performance. The cinematography, score, and setting of the film all groove seamlessly to create a space for a hilarious and poignant depiction of the cultural stagnation that characterized the decade. The film is one of Altman's best and it's a relatively unsung gem of the New Hollywood era. I'm a huge Raymond Chandler fan, and when I finally saw The Long Goodbye a few years ago, I was absolutely delighted. Such a fantastic movie. If your public library offers the Hoopla service (for streaming video and downloading e-books, including thousands of graphic novels from every publisher EXCEPT Marvel), The Long Goodbye is one of their offerings, so you can watch it for free. It definitely makes a perfect triple-feature with The Big Lebowski and Inherent Vice, I've been saying this for years.
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Nov 16, 2017 07:42
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precision posted:Here's an excellent and fairly comprehensive playlist of noir on YouTube: Subscribed! Thank you! If anyone wants a funny quick read, try and find Roger Ebert's write-up of Detour from Great Movies, where he spends the entire essay saying "This movie is incompetent and terrible and makes no sense, but I love it and can't stop watching it, so it's good." Detour is really good. See for yourself
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Nov 16, 2017 13:37
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Big Bad Voodoo Lou posted:It definitely makes a perfect triple-feature with The Big Lebowski and Inherent Vice, I've been saying this for years. See, I just couldn’t get into The Long Goodbye, while I love The Big Lebowski and really like Inherent Vice. Altman’s style does absolutely nothing for me, but I really wish it did. Franchescanado posted:If anyone wants a funny quick read, try and find Roger Ebert's write-up of Detour from Great Movies, where he spends the entire essay saying "This movie is incompetent and terrible and makes no sense, but I love it and can't stop watching it, so it's good." And Detour’s less than 70 minutes, you can knock it super quickly. Highly recommended, it’s really cool.
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Nov 16, 2017 14:44
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Big Bad Voodoo Lou posted:If your public library offers the Hoopla service (for streaming video and downloading e-books, including thousands of graphic novels from every publisher EXCEPT Marvel), The Long Goodbye is one of their offerings, so you can watch it for free. I looked into Hoopla, and my Library offers their service. This is loving rad and will save me even more money! Thanks bud.
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Nov 16, 2017 15:25
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Franchescanado posted:I looked into Hoopla, and my Library offers their service. This is loving rad and will save me even more money! Thanks bud. Just keep in mind, Hoopla has some really bad quality stuff. Their copy of Contamination was a orange and grainy VHS rip from a censored British copy that removed a lot of the gore, and I think either Phenomena or Messiah of Evil ended with a Windows Movie Maker screen saying “Thanks for watching!” instead of credits. I haven’t actually tried Kanopy yet, but I’ve signed up for it through my local library.
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Nov 16, 2017 15:55
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X-Ray Pecs posted:Just keep in mind, Hoopla has some really bad quality stuff. Their copy of Contamination was a orange and grainy VHS rip from a censored British copy that removed a lot of the gore, and I think either Phenomena or Messiah of Evil ended with a Windows Movie Maker screen saying “Thanks for watching!” instead of credits. I haven’t actually tried Kanopy yet, but I’ve signed up for it through my local library. Thanks for the heads up. The comics alone are worth it, but I'll keep that in mind for movies. I'll also look and see if my library does Kanopy, because that sounds cool too. edit: My library does not use Kanopy. 
Franchescanado fucked around with this message at 16:08 on Nov 16, 2017 |
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Nov 16, 2017 16:03
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So I watched 1948's Moonrise by Frank Borzage, who despite having been one of the formative auteurs of American cinema has become very underrated these days. A noir is atypical in his filmography, which is most renowned for his lyrical and sentimental romances in the late 1920s such as 7th Heaven and Lucky Star. While Moonrise plays very similar to those earlier films, with its themes of redemption and love, it also is much darker than any other film of his that I know of. Add to that its gorgeous black and white cinematography and rural Southern setting it'd make a nice double feature with The Night of the Hunter. It's opening scene is just incredible, with the first 2 shots being a 2001-level match cut: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wJ52iwHBlYo Full movie is here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eaQAOVjBg54
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Nov 18, 2017 07:47
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Angel Heart was good! More DeNiro than I expected, and less horror, but still pretty creepy! It really strides a fine line between some of the twistier and more straightforward noirs, where I almost got lost but kept a hold on the story through most of it (although I think I did miss how Harry tracked down Margaret's father). Really loved the eye for detail, and more than most other movies it made me feel like I was investigating, looking at objects for clues the way a real private investigator would. It's also really well shot, and has a great sense of time and place.
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Nov 20, 2017 18:01
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X-Ray Pecs posted:Angel Heart was good! More DeNiro than I expected, and less horror, but still pretty creepy! It really strides a fine line between some of the twistier and more straightforward noirs, where I almost got lost but kept a hold on the story through most of it (although I think I did miss how Harry tracked down Margaret's father). Really loved the eye for detail, and more than most other movies it made me feel like I was investigating, looking at objects for clues the way a real private investigator would. It's also really well shot, and has a great sense of time and place. I watched this over the weekend for one of my Horror movie nights. I had no idea it was the same director of Pink Floyd's The Wall. It was very good, and De Niro was excellent Also, I got a few people in the horror discord to watch The Hitch-Hiker together per your rec. It was very fun, and I quite enjoyed it.
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Nov 20, 2017 18:37
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The Hitch-Hiker is very good. It's the only classic noir directed by a woman, IIRC. If you don't have Prime it's also on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XIeFKTbg3Aw William Talman plays another villain very well in the B-noir City That Never Sleeps, which narrated by the city of Chicago: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T05soR6iKQQ Also just finished watching The Killers which has a fantastic opening 12 min (direct adaptation of Ernest Hemingway's short story) and a very good rest of the movie (fanfiction sequel to the Hemingway story). Between this and Double Indemnity, noir in the 1940s was really trying to make the insurance industry seem badass: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2VYHrnweUwE&t=514s Currently watching Odds Against Tomorrow and its amazing. Robert Wise owns.
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Nov 20, 2017 19:25
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Franchescanado posted:Also, I got a few people in the horror discord to watch The Hitch-Hiker together per your rec. It was very fun, and I quite enjoyed it. Hell yeah, I love that nasty little movie. If it had a body count, it would 100% be a horror classic. Also my favorite thing about Angel Heart is that it also has a story beat about a man loving his own daughter without realizing, just like Oldboy.
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Nov 21, 2017 00:52
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Ive been doing TSPDTs list for a bit, and I can't get over Deadline At Dawn. Its maudlin, cheesy, a buddy comedy as well as a murder mystery, all over the place. But it's my new favorite Noir, hands down.
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Nov 21, 2017 03:19
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Mike Hammer is the loving sleaziest protagonist ever, he rules. Kiss Me Deadly is awesome, and that end is doooooope.
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Nov 22, 2017 02:03
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X-Ray Pecs posted:Mike Hammer is the loving sleaziest protagonist ever, he rules. Kiss Me Deadly is awesome, and that end is doooooope. Couldn't agree more with this. Kiss Me Deadly is one of my favourite noirs, and the opening 15 minutes alone is endlessly rewatchable. (I'll also echo the love for Detour - watch it when you have an hour to spare!) Nroo posted:So I watched 1948's Moonrise by Frank Borzage, who despite having been one of the formative auteurs of American cinema has become very underrated these days. A noir is atypical in his filmography, which is most renowned for his lyrical and sentimental romances in the late 1920s such as 7th Heaven and Lucky Star. While Moonrise plays very similar to those earlier films, with its themes of redemption and love, it also is much darker than any other film of his that I know of. Add to that its gorgeous black and white cinematography and rural Southern setting it'd make a nice double feature with The Night of the Hunter. You've completely sold me on needing to see this - on top of just coming across it near the top of Eddie Muller's definitive 25 Noir Films list. Thanks for the link. I just recently watched I Wake Up Screaming from 1941, and two stars from the film stood out to me - Carole Landis as the attractive love interest Vicky Lynn and Laird Cregar as the sleazy cop Ed Cornell. I was excited to find out more of their work - only to discover both passed away at very young ages (29 & 30), with Cregar in particular dropping too much weight too fast before his heart gave out. Can anyone recommend any other standout performances from either of them? Cregar in particular stood out, comparable to Orson Welles before Welles gained that immense presence. friendo55 fucked around with this message at 20:17 on Nov 23, 2017 |
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Nov 23, 2017 20:05
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friendo55 posted:Couldn't agree more with this. Kiss Me Deadly is one of my favourite noirs, and the opening 15 minutes alone is endlessly rewatchable. I kinda knew what to expect, but the ending blew me away, what a hell of a finale.
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Nov 23, 2017 20:16
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X-Ray Pecs posted:I kinda knew what to expect, but the ending blew me away, what a hell of a finale.
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Nov 23, 2017 21:05
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Today I got my Blu-ray of They Made Me a Fugitive, a British noir from 1947 that I caught on Netflix a few years ago and IMO holds up against the best of the classic American noir of the period.  Starring Trevor Howard (The Third Man) as a WWII vet turned gangster who gets betrayed by his psychotic crime boss, the movie gets as brutal and bleak as classic noir ever got and has many stand-out scenes, like this weird self-contained bit that happens in the middle of the story: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nF-PUWGvXNE A high recommend for anybody interested in branching out to non-American noir.
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Nov 25, 2017 04:11
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Eli Wallach steals the show as the hired killer Dancer in The Lineup: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BCytJT6TL5s (Not great quality)
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Nov 26, 2017 21:20
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Spoilers below for Angel Heart, Oldboy, and Kiss Kiss Bang Bang Why did all three of the neo-noirs I watched this month all feature father-on-daughter incest? It's such an oddly specific crime, it almost feels like it's just being casually tossed around without any of the movies (except for KKBB to a certain extent) digging into how horrific, hosed up, and damaging it is. Almost like it's neo-noir's equivalent of adding a rape scene to a horror movie. That aside, I rewatched Kiss Kiss Bang Bang, and it's really incredible this was the first movie Shane Black directed, it's got extremely confident direction, it almost reminds me of how I felt watching The Big Lebowski the first few times, too swept up in the movie to get a chance to appreciate the craft. Really funny, dark, and sleazy, and Robert Downey Jr and Val Kilmer are great together. Really glad I decided to revisit this one.
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Nov 28, 2017 05:17
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Angel Face is awesome, I wasn’t expecting an actually romantic noir, and that element’s great. Mitchum and Simmons are great, and the legal drama aspect’s also really tense. I love how casual Mitchum is through the whole thing, you can tell he’s just in it for a casual fling, while Simmons is way more invested in this love affair. Really interesting spin on the dark romantic drama.
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Nov 29, 2017 03:46
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Nroo posted:The Hitch-Hiker is very good. It's the only classic noir directed by a woman, IIRC. If you don't have Prime it's also on YouTube: City That Never Sleeps kicked rear end, thanks babe
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Nov 29, 2017 03:58
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Transitioning into December with some Christmas themed noirs, I watched Lady in the Lake (1947) directed by and "starring" Robert Montgomery, who also directed and starred in the excellent noir Ride the Pink Horse the same year. It's a weird one, adapted from one of Raymond Chandler's Philip Marlowe detective novels it's shot almost entirely from the first-person point of view of the protagonist. So you've got Montgomery as Marlowe barking dickish comments to everyone from off-screen and everyone talks directly into the camera with campy, exaggerated performances. It's set during Christmas Eve and Christmas and the only music is an eerie vocal chorus. There's a ton of clever cuts and trick-shots to accomplish the FPS aesthetic within the limitations of 1940s tech that aren't exactly successful. And for what had to be budgetary reasons, a fairly important scene happens completely off screen. While most reviews call it an ambitious failure, I had a lot of fun with it despite its flaws. It clearly didn't take itself that seriously either, though the trailer was claiming it was revolutionary film-making: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m0k5GSZ7P5E
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Nov 29, 2017 07:11
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Yeah I don't think Lady in the Lake entirely succeeds but its fun enough. Kind of seems like a predecessor to found footage.
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Nov 29, 2017 07:37
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I realize it's late in the month here, but Black Coal, Thin Ice is a pretty great Chinese neo-noir if you haven't seen it. Gorgeous, moody use of light.      
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Nov 30, 2017 08:15
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Huh. By the guy who did Night Train, which I thought was excellent.
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Nov 30, 2017 15:27
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Finally checked out Killer's Kiss the other night. Pretty much what everyone said about it, some nice shots and you can see the director Kubrick would become peeking through in certain moments but it's just not all that compelling overall. I can definitely see why The Killing is considered the first time we got fully formed Kubrick.
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Nov 30, 2017 15:58
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Hey everyone, you should watch murder by contract. It's on YouTube here. The music is great and was done by the same guy who did the music for Beverly hillbillies.
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Nov 30, 2017 16:07
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Okay, here's the full list of everything I watched this month. Didn't reach my personal goal of 30 but everything was new-to-me and not a single bad film in the bunch. All in all it was a good month for me. I hope you all had a happy Noirvember!
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Dec 2, 2017 02:47
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The account that had moonrise up already got chopped and I hadn’t watched it yet 
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Dec 2, 2017 17:57
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DeimosRising posted:The account that had moonrise up already got chopped and I hadn’t watched it yet Watch it here, quick! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f2HhtELPHmA
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Dec 3, 2017 04:48
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