Category Archives: Movies

Jean Renoir parle de son art

Posted on October 24, 2011 by Brian

I copied down these words of Jean Renoir, originally spoken in French of course, from the subtitles accompanying an interview that Jacques Rivette did with Renoir in the 1960s. The program was called, “Jean Renoir parle de son art.” We … Continue reading →

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Kurosawa’s RAN

Posted on October 23, 2011 by Brian

I do count myself as a fan of King Lear , and I do count myself as a fan of Akira Kurosawa, but I don’t count myself as a fan of Ran. I’m not sure if I dislike Ran in … Continue reading →

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Cocteau on myth

Posted on October 17, 2011 by Brian

“I’ve always preferred mythology to history. Because history is made up of truths which eventually turn into lies. Mythology is made up of lies that eventually become truths.”

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CHINATOWN, plot, and the Noir plot

Posted on September 18, 2011 by Brian

I was looking at a long old essay I did in 2006 about the Polanski/Towne movie Chinatown, an example of neo-Noir.   Although I wouldn’t write the same essay today, some portions of the essay may contain some useful thinking about … Continue reading →

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David Foster Wallace on David Lynch

Posted on August 27, 2011 by Brian

There’s a fine interview of David Foster Wallace on the Charlie Rose Show of 3/27/97.  This is a transcript of a section in which they discuss the work of David Lynch and the notion of the “Lynchian.” DFW: What Lynchian … Continue reading →

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Godard in 1967 presages the House Republicans

Posted on July 31, 2011 by Brian

From Weekend (1967): I said to myself, what is the good of talking to them? If they buy knowledge, it’s only to resell it. They want knowledge to sell at a profit. They want nothing which would stand in the … Continue reading →

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Shamus, shammes, Seamus

Posted on July 20, 2011 by Ian

By my silence lately, dear reader, if you exist, you might have concluded that I’d run afoul of some Providence mobster, that I’d been whacked, rubbed out, offed. And where would that have left us? I think it was Aristotle … Continue reading →

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UPDATED: Revolting, and quite good

Posted on June 20, 2011 by Brian

To celebrate a recent day of perfect weather, I made sure to spend some time indoors watching movies.  I watched Short Cuts, and I also watched Salò. About Salò: most of the people I know wouldn’t be able to sit … Continue reading →

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Aragorn does Eliot

Posted on June 12, 2011 by Ian

From a New York Times editorial on T.S. Eliot’s “The Waste Land” as app: Another touch guides you to voices reading the whole poem aloud, including Eliot the poet and Viggo Mortensen, the “Lord of the Rings” star. There is … Continue reading →

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Warriors, come out and play-ay

Posted on June 11, 2011 by Ian

Like Xenophon’s “Anabasis,” on which it is based, the 1979 now-cult classic “The Warriors” stays with us because of how bad it is. I watched it the other night for the first time since college, after finding it on the … Continue reading →

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