Tag: Film

Gene Siskel, Best Films of the Year 1969-1998

Siskel compiled “best of the year” film lists from 1969 to 1998, which helped to provide an overview of his critical preferences. His top choices were:

From 1969 until his death in February 1999, he and Ebert were in agreement on nine annual top selections: Z, The Godfather, Nashville, The Right Stuff, Do the Right Thing, Goodfellas, Schindler’s List, Hoop Dreams, and Fargo. There would have been a tenth, but Ebert declined to rank the 9+1⁄2-hour documentary Shoah as 1985’s best film because he felt it was inappropriate to compare it to the rest of the year’s candidates.[66] Six times, Siskel’s number one choice did not appear on Ebert’s top ten list at all: Straight Time, Ragtime, Once Upon a Time in America, The Last Temptation of Christ, Hearts of Darkness, and The Ice Storm. Six times, Ebert’s top selection did not appear on Siskel’s; these films were 3 Women, An Unmarried Woman, Apocalypse Now, Sophie’s Choice, Mississippi Burning, and Dark City.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gene_Siskel

For more Siskel ->  https://siskelebert.org/

2024 – Best Movies, Desultory Notes Selection of

In no order. Selections mine, description IMDB’s.

Dune Part 2
Paul Atreides unites with the Fremen while on a warpath of revenge against the conspirators who destroyed his family. Facing a choice between the love of his life and the fate of the universe, he endeavors to prevent a terrible future.

Furiosa
The origin story of renegade warrior Furiosa before her encounter and teamup with Mad Max.

Sing Sing
Divine G, imprisoned at Sing Sing for a crime he didn’t commit, finds purpose by acting in a theatre group alongside other incarcerated men in this story of resilience, humanity, and the transformative power of art.

Souleymane’s Story
A Paris food delivery cyclist and asylum seeker named Souleymane has two days to prepare his story for a make-or-break interview to secure legal residency.

All We Imagine as Light
In Mumbai, Nurse Prabha’s routine is troubled when she receives an unexpected gift from her estranged husband. Her younger roommate, Anu, tries in vain to find a spot in the city to be intimate with her boyfriend.

eXistenz – trailer, quotes from

A game designer on the run from assassins must play her latest virtual reality creation with a marketing trainee to determine if the game has been damaged.

Allegra: So how does it feel?
Ted: What?
Allegra: Your real life. The one you came back for.
Ted: It feels completely unreal.
Allegra: You’re stuck now, aren’t ya? You want to go back to the Chinese restaurant because there’s nothing happening here. We’re safe. It’s boring.
Ted: It’s worse than that. I’m not sure… I’m not sure here, where we are, is real at all. This feels like a game to me. And you, you’re beginning to feel a bit like a game character.

Ted: Free will is obviously not a big factor in this little world of ours.
Allegra: It’s like real life. There’s just enough to make it interesting.

Ted: What was your life like before?
Gas: Before?
Ted: Before it was changed by Allegra Geller.
Gas: I operated a gas station.
Ted: You still operate a gas station, don’t you?
Gas: Only on the most pathetic level of reality.

Ted: It’s none of your business who sent us! We’re here and that is all that matters… God, what happened? I didn’t mean to say that.
Allegra: It’s your character who said it. It’s kind of a schizophrenic feeling, isn’t it? You’ll get used to it. There are things that have to be said to advance the plot and establish the characters, and those things get said whether you want to say them or not. Don’t fight it.

Allegra: What the hell was that?
Ted: That wasn’t me. That was my game character. I wouldn’t have done that. Not here anyway.
Allegra: Our characters are obviously supposed to jump on each other. It’s probably a pathetically mechanical attempt to heighten the emotional tension of the next game sequence. No use fighting it.

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0120907/quotes/?ref_=tt_dyk_qu

American Beauty – Quotes from

Brad Dupree: [reading Lester’s job description] “My job consists of basically masking my contempt for the assholes in charge, and, at least once a day, retiring to the men’s room so I can jerk off while I fantasize about a life that doesn’t so closely resemble Hell.” Well, you have absolutely no interest in saving yourself.
Lester Burnham: Brad, for 14 years I’ve been a whore for the advertising industry. The only way I could save myself now is if I start firebombing.


Lester Burnham: [narrating] Both my wife and daughter think I’m this gigantic loser and they’re right, I have lost something. I’m not exactly sure what it is but I know I didn’t always feel this… sedated. But you know what? It’s never too late to get it back.


Lester Burnham: When I was your age, I flipped burgers all summer just to be able to buy an eight-track.
Ricky Fitts: That sucks.
Lester Burnham: No, actually it was great. All I did was party and get laid. I had my whole life ahead of me.


Colonel Frank Fitts: Where’s your wife?
Lester Burnham: Uh, I dunno. Probably out fucking that dorky, prince-of-real-estate asshole. And you know what? I don’t care.
Colonel Frank Fitts: Your wife is with another man and you don’t care?
Lester Burnham: Nope. Our marriage is just for show. A commercial for how normal we are when we’re anything but.


Lester Burnham: I feel like I’ve been in a coma for the past twenty years. And I’m just now waking up.


Angela Hayes: Who are you looking for?
Jane Burnham: My parents are coming tonight. They’re trying to, you know, take an active interest in me.
Angela Hayes: Gross. I hate it when my mom does that.

Goodbye Esquire Theater

Say goodbye to another beloved Denver institution.

The Landmark Esquire Theatre will close after its final screenings on Thursday, July 18.

The theater is known for arthouse and independent films, as well as regular programming of the cult classics “Rocky Horror Picture Show” and “The Room.”
…
Jimenez said he wants to thank the Esquire for “all of the cool stuff that I’ve been able to see here and all of the stuff that I wasn’t able to see anywhere else.”

‘A great place for weirdos’: Who we met on closing weekend at the Esquire Theatre
Another icon of old Denver is fading into the past.

10 Ideas from Film School

TEN THINGS THEY TRIED TO TEACH ME IN FILM SCHOOL
Which took me years of humiliating mistakes to learn.

1. REMEMBER TO BREATHE
You’ve worked for two years to get to this moment, and there’s no guarantee you’ll ever get to do it again. You might as well enjoy it.

2. THE CAMERA IS A BUDDHA
It sees the world as it is. It doesn’t photograph your expectations or your fantasies. Try to see as the camera sees.

3. NO PLAN SURVIVES CONTACT WITH THE ENEMY
Overprepare and then be ready to throw it all away when the actor feels their character wouldn’t do it that way. Or you’re behind. Or both.

4. A GOOD IDEA CAN COME FROM ANYWHERE
You might as well listen to what others have to say because you’re going to get the credit (and the blame) anyway. Remember, the key grip has probably made six times as many movies as you have.

5. NO MOVIE CAN BE FUNNY ENOUGH
Laughter lets the audience know they’re in good hands. They let their guard dwn and become vulnerable to the serious stuff.

6. ON EVERY PRODUCTION
The director loses faith in the movie, the actors lose faith in the director, the crew hates the actors. Somehow it all works out.

7. THE AUDIENCE’S ATTENTION SPAN IS EVEN SHORTER THAN YOURS
Fill every moment. Be generous. Give them gifts: jokes, secrets, surprises, truths. The minute they’re bored, they’ll check their email.

8. THE ACTORS MOVE THE CAMERA, THE CAMERA DOESN’T MOVE THE ACTORS
Unless you have a style, don’t pretend you do.

9. MAKE THE MOVIE FOR ONE PERSON AT A TIME
Imagine your fourth-grade teacher sitting alone in the dark.

10. WHERE THERE IS NO SOLUTION, THERE IS NO PROBLEM
As Hannibal said while deciding to cross the Alps, “I will find a way or I will make one.”

P.S. NONE OF THESE RULES make any difference if you don’t have a good script.

Hits, Flops, and Other Illusions: My Fortysomething Years in Hollywood
Ed Zwick

The most beautiful thing in the world to me is an empty parking lot at night – Harmony Korine Interview

Korine has always seen the world in a visual way. “It’s an affliction,” he says. “I can’t even read books or scripts because I spend the entire time imagining the room or the streets. It’s exhausting.”

Maybe so, but from the moment I first watched Gummo, I’ve been intrigued as to what it’s like living inside his head.

“I wouldn’t wish that on anybody, it’s trippy,” he says with a smile.

Is that why he finds it so hard explaining his motives? Perhaps, but towards the end of our conversation he breaks off from one of his more impenetrable passages and takes a different approach: “The most beautiful thing in the world to me is an empty parking lot at night,” he says. “You know, with the street lamps and an overturned milk crate. It’s mostly me trying to show you that. Do you know what I’m saying?”

And actually, this time, I think I sort of do.

Our time up, Korine heads off to meet the photographer inside the gallery. When I pop over to say goodbye I find him pulling on – what else? – a fluorescent green balaclava for the photoshoot. He is adamant that he shouldn’t be pictured without it. Our photographer is not so sure: “We want people to know that it’s you,” she reasons.

“This is me,” says Korine. And he’s probably right. If, that is, he even exists.

‘I burned out – and started mowing lawns’: a reality-bending chat with Harmony Korine
He rocketed to notoriety at 19 with the shocking film Kids. Now, at 51, he’s smoking two fat cigars for breakfast – and making retina-burning work with acids and infrared cameras. Our writer gets deep with the eternal enfant terrible

Al Pacino in Dog Day Afternoon – Stanley Kauffman on

My admiration for Lumet and Pacino has had discernible limits in the past, but here, happily, I can change my tune. Lumet, at fifty much less of a show-off than Lumet at thirty-five or forty, directs with simplified technique and deepened perceptions. Pacino is not called on here to radiate quiet power, at which he failed in both Godfather films. Here he is fortune’s fool—a pawn who is being played at the same time that he thinks he’s masterminding the game. This summer I went to a racetrack for the first time in ten years, and outside the gate there was a tout selling a tip sheet for a dollar—eight sure winners. His elbows were sticking out of his ragged jacket, but he had eight sure winners. Pacino, about to lick his condition in the world and his personal troubles by being smarter than the world, has his figurative elbows sticking out. The pseudosuperiority, this pathos of self-deceived bravado, Pacino handles very well.

Before My Eyes: Film Comment And Criticism
Stanley Kauffmann

Office Space – 3 Quotes

Dom Portwood: Hi, Peter. What’s happening? We need to talk about your TPS reports.
Peter Gibbons: Yeah. The coversheet. I know, I know. Uh, Bill talked to me about it.
Dom Portwood: Yeah. Did you get that memo?
Peter Gibbons: Yeah. I got the memo. And I understand the policy. And the problem is just that I forgot the one time. And I’ve already taken care of it so it’s not even really a problem anymore.
Dom Portwood: Ah! Yeah. It’s just we’re putting new coversheets on all the TPS reports before they go out now. So if you could go ahead and try to remember to do that from now on, that’d be great. All right!

Stan, Chotchkie’s Manager: We need to talk about your flair.
Joanna: Really? I… I have fifteen pieces on. I, also…
Stan, Chotchkie’s Manager: Well, okay. Fifteen is the minimum, okay?
Joanna: Okay.
Stan, Chotchkie’s Manager: Now, you know it’s up to you whether or not you want to just do the bare minimum. Or… well, like Brian, for example, has thirty seven pieces of flair, okay. And a terrific smile.
Joanna: Okay. So you… you want me to wear more?
Stan, Chotchkie’s Manager: Look. Joanna.
Joanna: Yeah.
Stan, Chotchkie’s Manager: People can get a cheeseburger anywhere, okay? They come to Chotchkie’s for the atmosphere and the attitude. Okay? That’s what the flair’s about. It’s about fun.
Joanna: Yeah. Okay. So more then, yeah?
Stan, Chotchkie’s Manager: Look, we want you to express yourself, okay? Now if you feel that the bare minimum is enough, then okay. But some people choose to wear more and we encourage that, okay? You do want to express yourself, don’t you?
Joanna: Yeah, yeah.
Stan, Chotchkie’s Manager: Okay. Great. Great. That’s all I ask.

Peter Gibbons: Let me ask you something. When you come in on Monday and you’re not feeling real well, does anyone ever say to you, “Sounds like someone has a case of the Mondays?”
Lawrence: No. No, man. Shit, no, man. I believe you’d get your ass kicked sayin’ something like that, man.

IMDB

Random Movie Details – Reddit

What’s a small detail in a movie that most people wouldn’t notice, but that you know about and are willing to share?
byu/Stuck_in_a_depo inmovies

InvasionXX
In Pulp Fiction, Vincent Vega and Mia Wallace return home with the trophy from the dance competition at Jack Rabbit Slims, suggesting they won. However, later in the movie you can barely hear in a news announcement on TV that a trophy has been stolen from a local dance competition, suggesting instead that Mia and Vincent lost and stole the trophy.

BlakeSiefken
In the first Terminator movie, “fuck you, asshole” appears near the bottom of the list of possible responses because it’s the same line that Bill Paxton says to him at the start of the film. The Terminator is a learning computer; the more interaction he has with humans, the more he learns. He learned the line from Bill Paxton’s character and added it to his list.

gurk_the_magnificent
Lots of people probably know about this one, but my favorite is Back to the Future. The mall starts as “Twin Pine Mall”, but Marty runs over a tree when he initially goes back to 1955, and when he returns to 1985 the mall is “Lone Pine Mall”.

Bourbone
This is a small music one.
We’re all familiar with the “dah dum” of the jaws theme.
Well, Williams used it masterfully to fully scare you in the last act in a way you don’t expect.
Throughout the movie, the jaws theme never lies.
When you hear it, the shark is there. When you DONT hear it, like when the main guy is overreacting about the kid on the beach day, the shark isn’t there.
Williams gets you to subconsciously trust that shark theme by proving that it works in every case.
This makes it scary AF, when in the final scene on the Orca, the shark appears out of nowhere without the music warning you first. It just comes up and chomps the boat.
Williams spent ~2 hours setting up that moment perfectly.

my_simple-review
In Goodfellas, when Ray Liotta is applying for witness protection, the prosecutor who is speaking with him is Ed McDonald, who was the real federal prosecutor in Henry Hill’s court case.

ImaginaryNemesis

The final scene with Ray Liotta in witness protection is a great wardrobe joke if you’ve been paying attention.
Through the whole movie, clothes are used to show people’s status. The members of the mob are generally shown in darker earth tones, and the ‘normies’ are in bright colors.
There’s a gag around the start where mobsters have stolen a truck of clothes and they all look out of place trying on brightly colored sweaters.
You can track Karen’s descent into crime from the changes in the color of her clothes.
Having Henry open the door at the end in a poorly fitting pastel blue bath robe is hilarious.

Pizzazzinator
The naked people at the end of Hereditary were all the same people at Annie’s support group, so it was a long con to get to Paimon.

TLMoss
In Finding Nemo, in the fish tank in the Dentist’s office, the fish use proper dental terminology when they discuss the procedures.

RadLibRaphaelWarnock
In Baby Driver, there is a scene towards the end where the protagonist steals an old lady’s car. He turns the radio to 97.1, where “Radar Love” by Golden Earring starts playing. The film takes place in Atlanta, and there is only one radio station in the city that would play music like that – 97.1 The River.
A cool little detail in a movie full of them.

ridd666
I shared it in another thread, but in the movie Frailty, when the father kills Demons, there is blood on the demon, but never shown on the dad or sons, or the weapons.
But when he kills an innocent, in this see the sheriff gets killed, the blood is everywhere. On the weapon, the dad, his hands, the kids clothes and even his face.
A small but awesome detail.

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind – Quotes from

Clementine: This is it, Joel. It’s going to be gone soon.
Joel: I know.
Clementine: What do we do?
Joel: Enjoy it.


[Mary reads to Dr. Mierzwiak out of “Bartlett’s Familiar Quotations”; the lines are from Alexander Pope’s poem “Eloisa to Abelard”]
Mary: How happy is the blameless vestal’s lot! / The world forgetting, by the world forgot / Eternal sunshine of the spotless mind! / Each pray’r accepted, and each wish resign’d.


Joel: Constantly talking isn’t necessarily communicating.


[last lines]
Joel: I can’t see anything that I don’t like about you.
Clementine: But you will! But you will. You know, you will think of things. And I’ll get bored with you and feel trapped because that’s what happens with me.
Joel: Okay.
Clementine: [pauses] Okay.


Mary: Blessed are the forgetful, for they get the better even of their blunders.
[they click glasses]
Mary: Nietzsche. Beyond Good and Evil. Found it in my Bartlett’s.

5 Best Movies of 2023

No order. Selections mine, summary via IMDB

Beau is Afraid
Following the sudden death of his mother, a mild-mannered but anxiety-ridden man confronts his darkest fears as he embarks on an epic, Kafkaesque odyssey back home.

The Holdovers
A cranky history teacher at a remote prep school is forced to remain on campus over the holidays with a troubled student who has no place to go.

Talk to Me
When a group of friends discover how to conjure spirits using an embalmed hand, they become hooked on the new thrill, until one of them goes too far and unleashes terrifying supernatural forces.

Little Richard: I am Everything
The life and career of Little Richard, the one-of-a-kind rock ‘n’ roll icon who shaped the world of music.

Barbie
Barbie suffers a crisis that leads her to question her world and her existence.