LET'S TALK ABOUT IT - SEPT 2023

0 chat in August. Consider going to quarterly beginning in Oct? (i.e., Let's Talk About It Oct-Dec 2023)

>1 featherbear: Sounds like a good idea. Maybe even extend it to the "what are we watching" topics?

>1 featherbear: You are doing a marvelous job with this group. Thank you, thank you, thank you, from the bottom of my heart! I was absolutely the last person in the world to EVER have a group that did anything but read a book!!!:) I believe that you may be on the right track to think about doing the site on a quarterly basis. You have some folks like >2 KeithChaffee: that are becoming more and more active. I DO read the posts here. May I suggest...and it is ONLY a suggestion and entirely up to you. You might want to start posting a question that would encourage folks to give their opinions. Like...What is your favorite type of program or movie and why? What bugs you the most about what is on your TV or movie screen? I have found that if people are lead, they usually will follow. I know I cannot resist answering a poll:) Something you may also want to explore, and I would be willing to do this if you don't have the time. There are 77 listed members of this group. What do you think of sending a message to each one, and asking what they would like to see in the group? I'm not sure if the group members are dropped off if they are no longer members of LibraryThing or have left a group...but it may be worth a try.

>3 Carol420: >2 KeithChaffee:
Shifting to quarterly in Oct would allow me to synch with my book review thread, which I restart quarterly. Also meaning to suggest restarting the RIP thread annually (quarterly updates might be a little too morbid!). The thread for books *about* movies (as opposed to the thread about movies based on books) currently is indefinite chronologically; since it doesn't get a lot of traffic, maybe restart annually as well? Opinion surveys can generate interest, but my experience with Twitter/X is surveys can get rather bloody minded if a particular topic strikes a raw nerve, so one must be careful.

PS I'm fine w/TV/movies Watched also shifting to quarterly.

I am generally one who prefers things to be clumped into a few big piles rather than divided into lots of little piles, so I'd almost always prefer that relatively slow topics be allowed to run however long they can before the mechanics of the system require them to be restarted (which appears to be somewhere around 250 posts or so?). Most of the topics in this group look like they could easily hold a year's worth of conversation.

I like Carol420's idea of a conversation-starter topic, something like the "Questions for the Avid Reader" topic in the Club Read group, where a new questions is put forth once a week or so. I'd be willing to take a shot at organizing such a thing if there were any interest.

>4 featherbear: As I said, you are doing a fantastic job...I am happy to leave it to you and perhaps >5 KeithChaffee: Would be a great helper if you need one. I will leave you to it and whatever you decide to do I'm sure it will be for the best of the group. If you should need me to do something, just ask. I am at your service:)

>5 KeithChaffee: >6 Carol420:
How does this sound?

New RIP thread beginning Jan 2024, restart Jan 2025 (if at least one administrator is still alive).

Use the current chat thread to include "conversation starters" which Keith is free to initiate, but I restart chat thread in 2024 (annual update) -- any other chat topic is fine of course; I tend to focus more on the intersection of economics & aesthetics. Topics can become dated would be my reasoning, so a broad timeline could be helpful.

Leave the "books about" thread open ended unless it gets unwieldly.

Currently the Movies Based On Books thread is updated monthly: change to open-ended in October; revisit if it gets unwieldly.

I'd like to do the What We're Watching thread as a quarterly beginning in Oct & revisit the quarterly experiment at the end of 2024 barring unexpected external disasters.

>7 featherbear: All sounds good to me. The "current chat thread" is the one we're in now, right?

I'll take a couple of days to come up with a good first conversation starter, then shoot for a new one once a week.

>7 featherbear: Perfect! Good planning.

>8 KeithChaffee: Correct, you're on it!

Joshua Keating. Atlantic, 09/03/2023: Confessions of a Netflix DVD Dead-Ender.

Not necessarily restricted to movie reviews & articles -- I notice this when checking out book reviews & other articles -- but I notice the practice of the online sites often following the date of posting with the estimated amount of time needed to read the article. As a slow -- rather, leisurely reader, it always makes me a bit uncomfortable -- also wondering if their AI robots keep track of my reading speed & adjust the estimated time to my click??

So, in the spirit of "if it works, steal it," we're going to borrow the concept of Club Read's "Questions for the Avid Reader" topic with a weekly discussion question about movies posed by yours truly(*), in the hopes of sparking conversation and maybe just a teeny bit of (always polite) controversy. We'll begin with an easy one:

(*I've taken on the job of semi-official interlocutor, but interesting questions are always welcome, so if you have suggestions or thoughts about possible questions, please do share.)

QUESTION #1: What's your favorite movie and why?

For most of us, it's probably more accurate to say "favorite movies," because it's so hard to pick just one, so if you're feeling torn, feel free to answer with two or three. And if you're in a different mood tomorrow, chime in again with that day's favorite.

And don't worry that your favorite is too obscure or too popular to be worth talking about. If it's obscure, then surely everyone would welcome hearing about it. And if it's popular, well, there's not a movie in the world that everyone has seen, and none of us have heard your thoughts about it. So whether it's Casablanca or that 1940s Romanian noir vampire musical you've always loved, share it with us!

>13 KeithChaffee: OH...I have really been looking forward to this. Thank you for taking this on...and good question. I used to watch a lot of movies...my mother lived with us, and she loved them. My absolute, all-time favorite is A Few Good Men Tom Cruise, Jack Nicholson, Demi Moore, Kevin Bacon, and Kevin Pollak. While the cast wasn't difficult to look at in their uniforms...I really liked the trial scene. It was rewarding to say the least to see the "top dog" put in his place.

I also liked Air Force One, Harrison Ford, Glen Close. Harison Ford was the ideal portrayal of what a "perfect President" should be. He got the job done in 125 minutes!...and was still smiling.

I also love any Stephen King book that was sever made into a movie...I own them all...but my favorite is Pet Semetary. I love being scared to death:) actually none of those types of movies or books eve scared me. My husband thinks there is something really wrong with me:))

My favorite varies from day to day, but there are two that are always near the top. What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? (1962) is a magnificent camp festival. Bette Davis and Joan Crawford star; Davis is a former child star whose bitterness leads her to torment Crawford, her paraplegic sister. The movie's success kicked off a decade of "psycho-biddy" movies about murderous older women. "Older" is relative, of course. Davis and Crawford were both in their mid-fifties when the movie was made, or about twenty years younger than Meryl Streep is now, but were costumed and styled to look like decrepit women on the edge of death. Every few years, there is talk of a remake, and the rumors about casting are always fun, if only because there are so many possible combinations of actresses who would be glorious to watch in those roles.

And Disney's Beauty and the Beast -- the 1991 animated film, thank you very much; we will not speak of the 2017 "live-action" remake -- is a damn near perfect movie. Every time I see Belle come down that grand staircase in her yellow gown while Angela Lansbury starts to sing the title song, I get teary-eyed. I have always identified strongly with Belle. "What's that you say? You want to take me away from this closed-minded little town, lock me up in a gorgeous castle with a fleet of servants devoted to my every need and a massive library of all the books I could want, where I will meet the gorgeous man (well, eventually he'll be a gorgeous man...) of my dreams? Yes, please!"

Off the top of my head, 2 from childhood, both via TV: Seven Samurai (Honolulu TV had a lot of Japanese programming) & the Charles Laughton film that featured Robert Mitchum & Shelley Winters, Night of the Hunter (scared the bejeesus out of me! but the artifice of the children floating down the river shot through a spider web awakened my aesthetic sense in some way), and, one of the first European movies that captured my fancy when I attended college in New York, Jules and Jim, a "movie movie" as the phrase goes. Grad school in New Haven, thanks to the student film festivals: the first dance sequence in Swing Time with Ginger Rogers & Fred Astaire, plus I would watch the Alistair Sim version of A Christmas Carol from the 1950s, alone in the grad student lounge during Christmas break; a tradition from childhood (re-watching it, I mean).

>16 featherbear: Have you ever heard the musical adaptation of Night of the Hunter? It's only been staged a few times, but they put out a concept album about 25 years ago. It's a fascinating project. The big ensemble number at the end of the first act is (as so many Broadway numbers are) strongly influenced by religious choral music, but instead of the loose, ecstatic bounce of southern gospel, it's got the square rigidity of New England Protestantism.

>17 KeithChaffee: I have not, though I am reminded that Robert Mitchum could sing, after a fashion (I'm sure he wasn't in the musical), not to mention his nightmarish Leaning in the Arms of the Lord as he tracked down the poor children in the Laughton film.

As an addendum, to my favorites list, after I finished grad school & started working in a library in the late 70s, the cheap rerun theaters on New Haven's College Street began to close down, & one of the last movies I caught was McCabe and Mrs Miller, probably my favorite Western, above even The Wild Bunch & The Good, the Bad, & the Ugly (both go back to college days in NY). The first run theaters moved out to the suburbs off one of the highways in Orange CT, though the York hung around on New Haven's Broadway area for a while, & I remember watching Kubrick's Barry Lyndon & Altman's The Long Goodbye there several times. After that, lacking driving ability all my life, most of my movie memories originate from the early 90s when I finally got a TV & VHS, then DVD player, and, via the rental shops of downtown New Haven, I was introduced to Mizoguchi's Ugetsu & Max Ophuls' Letter from an Unknown Woman & (just remembered) Arthur Penn's The Miracle Worker! I think I caught Kubrick's The Shining about the time I was watching Altman films early in my working career, having become a fan of Shelley Duvall, so I'm guessing it was at one of the rerun theaters before my movie hiatus in the 80s.

I was a huge fan of movie musicals in my teenage years and retain the highest regard for Astaire/Rogers films. The plots are flimsy in the extreme but their dances together are poetry in motion. A particular favourite is 'Swingtime' in which their 'farewell' dance near the end of the film (which Ginger records as being absolutely fiendishto do with multiple takes)is exquisite.
I should note however that Astaire in a tribute to the great Bill Robinson appears in blackface for the only time in his career. Although well intentioned it makes one wince now.

Lane Brown, with reporting by Luke Winkie. Vulture, 09/06/2023: The Decomposition of Rotten Tomatoes. "The most overrated metric in movies is erratic, reductive, and easily hacked — and yet has Hollywood in its grip."

>19 Maura49: I believe it would make me wince now also. Times have changed a lot, haven't they?

>19 Maura49: >21 Carol420:

Another number that struck me as on the cringe-y side was "Slap that bass" in Shall We Dance, not blackface, where Astaire does tap in the stylized engine room of an ocean liner, to an adoring audience of black stokers; "thank you for lending your prestige to our musical & dance culture"

Background on LT issues over the weekend.

Charlie Warzel. The Atlantic, 09/08/2023: Streaming Has Reached Its Sad, Predictable Fate.

Richard Brody. New Yorker, 08/25/2023. What We Lose When Streaming Companies Choose What We Watch.

>24 featherbear: thank you for the articles. I wa able to read the New Yorker one. Very interesting and I agreed with every word. I do pick up movies from streamers to a limited extent but my DVD/Blu ray collection is very important to me.

QUESTION #2: Who do you love?

If their name is on the poster, you're going to be in the theater on opening weekend. If their face pops up on the TV while you're flipping channels, you're going to stop and watch. And even the slightest rumor of their next project is enough to fill you with anticipation. Who are the filmmakers -- actors, directors, craftspeople -- on your must-see list?

I'm not sure that these people are still in any movies, but I do really like them. Liam Nesson and Steven Segal were always favorites and in spite of his unpopularity with some die-hard movie fans...I always liked Tom Cruise....but my all-time favorite, I'd watch anything that he's in...is Patrick Swayze..."Nobody puts Baby in a corner"

>27 Carol420: Steven Seagal is still working, but mostly in direct-to-video movies; he hasn't been in a movie that had a wide theatrical release since Machete in 2010. Liam Neeson still has a robust theatrical career, but for the last fifteen years or so, he's basically turned himself into -- well, into Steven Seagal, making a long series of movies in which he is an ex-cop/government agent/spy who is forced to use his "special set of skills" to save a kidnapped daughter/wife/best friend's cousin's niece. And kudos to both of them, I say; it's hard to find success in Hollywood, and if you find a niche and a loyal fanbase that will keep you working, by golly, stick with it.

As for my own "I will follow them anywhere" list, they tend not to be actors, just because actors have to take a fair number of "pay the bills" jobs in undistinguished movies. The people I'm more likely to follow without reservation are directors who are at least a little bit outside the mainstream, or who have earned enough clout to do what they want to do. The Coen brothers are on my list, and I look forward to seeing how their individual careers develop now that they've decided to work separately for a while. I haven't seen all of his early Greek-language films, but I love Yorgos Lanthimos, and am happy to see the great early reviews for the upcoming Poor Things. And there's only one disappointing movie on Rian Johnson's filmography (that would be The Brothers Bloom).

But I think my biggest "I'm there" name doesn't belong to any single person: It's Pixar. Twenty-seven movies, only one outright stinker in the bunch (Cars 2 -- who thought that putting Mater at the center of any story was a good idea, much less a James Bond spoof?). I don't always agree with the general consensus on which are the truly great Pixar movies -- Wall-E is by a long shot the most overrated, and Coco doesn't get nearly as much love as it deserves -- but there's no name that fills me with as much certainty that I'm in for a good time.

>29 KeithChaffee: One thing you could always count on with a Pixar movie, was that you could usually take your kids, or let them go with friends, without worrying about what new words or activities they were going to learn.

Barbara Streisand films, musicals and I also love documentaries and biographies. I am reading a book on John Hughes and am going to re-watch some of his films!

>31 JulieLill: I liked his Planes Trains and Automobiles, Home Alone, and The Great Outdoors. I'm sure there are more but those are the ones that I remember. I believe he also did 101 Dalmatians. That was cute.

I am a big fan of Film Noir and it is in these dark streets and chiaroscuro lighting that I first discovered Barbara Stanwyck who stars in, for me, the supreme noir- ‘Double Indemnity’. She plays the woman who leads men astray like no other actress of her time.
She can also play comedy beautifully as fans of ‘The Lady Eve’ will know. I have acquired those of her films that I can but here in the UK availability is limited and I always feel lucky if I find one being screened on TV that I did not know. I love all of the great female stars of the 30’s and 40’s but Barbara Stanwyck is the one who shines brightest for me.

You know what I love the most? We have had more conversation on this site in the last two weeks than we've had in 6 years! Keep up the good work.

>33 Maura49: My mother loved Film Noir. I bought several for her from Amazon and E-Bay. There was a man on E-Bay that was selling a huge collection that he had recorded onto DVD's. The whole collection, there was over 50 of them, for $100.00. I don't remember the titles of all of them, just the ones she always asked to watch the most. She loved 'The Woman in The Window", "The Missing Corpse" , 'The Fat Man" (that was Rock Hudson), "Framed" (Glenn Ford), I like "Inner Sanctum". (someone named Charles Russell that I had never heard of). I always hoped that if I had to stay to pause or stop the DVD for her to go to the kitchen or the bathroom, that she would want that one. For some reason she never wanted to learn to operate the DVD player. The most god-awful thing I ever watched from that batch was a thing called...and I couldn't possibly make this up..."I Am a Fugitive from A Chain Gang", made in the early 1930's and staring (if you could call it that) ... someone called Mervyn LeRoy. I would watch the whole bunch including that one, again if I could have her back.

>34 Carol420: I know exactly what you mean as I too lost my mother some years ago and things she loved sre always reminding me of her.

What a great collection of noirs. I must make notes.

>35 Maura49: Just stay away from "I Am A Fugitive From a Chain Gang:)

>34 Carol420: I'm almost afraid to tell you that I Am a Fugitive from a Chain Gang is the best-known of the movies you mention. It's generally well-regarded as a powerful, albeit melodramatic, look at what were then the harsh realities of the American prison system. The movie got glowing reviews in its day, and three Oscar nominations, including Best Picture and Best Actor (Paul Muni; Mervyn LeRoy is the director's name); in 1991, the Library of Congress added it to their National Film Registry of "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant films" that it deems particularly worthy of preservation.

Which is not, of course, to say that your distaste for the movie is wrong. People like/hate what they like/hate, and the minority views are often the most interesting. (Hmmm... there might be a weekly discussion question in there somewhere....)

>37 KeithChaffee: Oh believe me, I know and understand about peoples likes and dislikes, and I agree that everyone has the right to express them about whatever they wish. I will defend their right to do so. I'm glad someone...well lots of someone's obviously... liked it, and my mother would have been ecstatic to know that it got so many awards. She couldn't stand to be in the same room with Dirty Dancing which I watched a million or so times:)

QUESTION #3: On your own little island...

Everybody's got one or two movies where they feel at odds with the general consensus -- a movie or an actor the world loves that you just don't get, or something you love that no one else takes seriously. What are your biggest divergences from what "they say"?

>39 KeithChaffee: a. "no one else takes seriously": I've been a fan of Freebie and the Bean from the first time I saw it at a 2nd run movie theater on Whalley Avenue in New Haven. I have learned recently that Quentin Tarantino also likes it, so maybe it doesn't quite count -- however I'm also fond of Miami Blues which he thinks ruins the book, & I don't agree there (& I did enjoy the book). I also sense that Death Proof is not a popular choice within Tarantino's oeuvre but it's one of my favorites.

b. "general consensus": I didn't like the Top Gun sequel & haven't bothered to watch the original; glamorized militarism -- Lion King & Toy Story, meh -- could be an age thing; too old to appreciate when I saw them -- on the other hand, A Few Good Men also meh when I saw it in my sunset years

>39 KeithChaffee: Pretty much everyone I know absolutely loves The Princess Bride movie, and quotes lines from it constantly. I saw it in the theaters when it first came out, and I thought it was ... fine. I don't understand the extreme levels of affection for it at all, and no one's ever been able to explain why they feel that way to me. Maybe someone here can finally crack the code!

I don't enjoy The Philadelphia Story. It may have been zippy and fast-paced in its day, but it's sluggish now, and no one in it talks like a real person; everyone talks exclusively in punchlines and snarky insults. It's as if every role in the movie was played by Karen Walker from Will & Grace.

I have tried repeatedly, but I just can't sit through The Godfather. As soon as Marlon Brando starts mumbling, I'm out, because I can't understand a word he's saying.

And I don't really get the fuss about Daniel Day-Lewis or Daniel Craig. I mean, they're perfectly fine actors, but their performances don't thrill me the way they seem to thrill most people. I don't even think they're particularly attractive; they've both got immobile faces that might as well be carved from stone for all they communicate.

>37 KeithChaffee: Hello everyone! Just joining and had to mention a different film directed by LeRoy, Anthony Adverse (1936). I have a copy on VHS that I watched and enjoyed a year or two ago. A lot of big name talent in this one including Olivia de Havilland.

I'd say one of my favorite films is Terminator (the original). On a lighter tone, The Jerk is classic comedy, and Ghostbusters and Drugstore Cowboy are also favorites.

I have a wide ranging taste in film and a physical media collection to match. I haven't put any of it on LibraryThing at this point. I've been using a free database app called Memento for several years that I find works for me. Does anyone use LibraryThing to index their media outside of books?

>43 monkity: I use LT to catalog DVDs, blurays & streaming licenses I own, but I'm pretty far behind; I believe I still have quite a few books I haven't gotten around to cataloging. With regard to the DVD/blurays my general vague plan is to catalog each title after re-watching as soon as my Netflix DVD subscription expires at the end of Sept. (Although Netflix is threatening to send a bunch of subscribers' queued items to clear their warehouse shelves; I'll believe that when/if it happens). Unfortunately I have a large pile of uncataloged & to be watched TV series I picked up when companies started dumping them at remainder prices when Netflix & other streaming services started ramping up. Two recent acquisitions I did add on LT: Broad City & Orphan Black. I ought to catalog some of my comparatively modest educational, jazz, classical, & opera CDs (some of the lectures are also streaming licenses) but haven't had the time; too busy exploring the Spotify library.

I know I'm a day late...but the wish is just as warm...have a happy Yom Kippur to all our friends who celebrate.

QUESTION #4: What ever happened to the romantic comedy?

Twenty-five years ago, we were living through a golden age of romantic comedy. In 1998 alone, we had There's Something About Mary, The Wedding Singer, Sliding Doors,and You've Got Mail; and How Stella Got Her Groove Back and Shakespeare in Love were at least rom-com adjacent.

But now? It feels like it's been years since there was a successful romantic comedy in the theaters. The genre hasn't vanished entirely, but it seems to have been moved mostly to streaming services, and the primary target audience for much of the genre is teenaged girls.

What has brought the once mighty rom-com to such a sorry state? Can this genre be saved?

>46 KeithChaffee: Hi, everyone. I'm new to the group (far more active on letterboxd, the site for film watchers / cataloguers).

Streaming algorithms, of course. I joke. Okay, I'm only partially joking.

I think the simplest answer is there have been a multitude of factors.

Hollywood saw what brought the most money (superhero films, franchises/IPs) and romcoms weren't part of that equation. Add the pandemic, which exacerbated movie theatre versus streaming tensions even further, and one can argue it's been a perfect storm for romcoms. And while we have a variety of comedians, how many actors/comedians are associated with the romcom genre itself? The trend for longer films (to make it feel like more bang for your buck at your theatre) works against the genre. A change in attitudes/cultures, too, I reckon played a role - what is funny now, what isn't going to be simultaneously offensive. I read two fairly recent reviews of You've Got Mail from letterboxd friends, which while praising the film in general were creeped out by Tom Hanks's character and his duplicity. Anecdotal evidence, I know, but it asks a question.

https://www.looper.com/308278/the-real-reason-big-screen-romantic-comedies-stopp...

The above article was updated January 2023.

I don't have any qualms about it being "saved." It will evolve. We'll still have romance films, heck romcom films, too, but they'll look different just as much 1980s romcoms aren't the same as 1930s romcoms (which also weren't the same pre-Hays Code versus post-Hays code enforcement). I doubt we'll have a proliferation of them any time soon though. The entire mood of 2010s/2020s films has been the serious or bigger, the better, something that doesn't fit well with the romcom genre as a whole.

>47 petricor: I think you're right that some older romcoms look a little icky in light of changing attitudes about gender. I'd add that because romcoms depend to a large extent on gender norms -- reinforcing in some ways, questioning in others -- that the blurring of those norms is happening faster than screenwriters have been able to adapt to. The more there are no rules, the harder it becomes to tell stories in which the breaking of those rules is crucial to the plot.

And yes, the loss of the mid-budget movie has been a huge factor. Movies today are either multi-million dollar special effects extravaganzas or art-house/foreign movies that will play to crowds of ten people for one week in LA and NY; no one wants to make movies about relatively normal people living relatively normal lives. And that's related to:

how many actors/comedians are associated with the romcom genre itself?

In an era when the movie itself is the star, when people are going to see the stunts and the effects and the Stuff Blowed Up Real Good, there are no movie stars. And the romcom depends on movie stars. What do we remember about the classic romcoms? We remember Tom & Meg or Julia & Hugh or Cary & Katherine

A quirkier piece of the problem: There is very often a moment in a romcom where the plot hinges on whether Partner A will be able to contact Partner B in time to stop them from (leaving, making a crucial mistake, saying the wrong thing to person C...); the cell phone essentially eliminates the "how do I reach them?" crisis.

>47 petricor: I was notified this morning that you were a new member to this group. Welcome and I hope you have a lot of fun.

In answer to the question...The movie industry is like any other public driven business...it will produce whatever the public will buy at any given time. Romance seems to be making somewhat of a comeback...at least in the literary industry. You can get romance books in dozens of different genera. I think the "romance" had to be tempered more on the screen than on the page. Reading about the romantic antics of the two of any sex was much easier to "filter" in your head than on the screen. Actually, I never saw much "comical" about romance...seems as foreign as a romantic murder.

By the way, >48 KeithChaffee:. Thank you for putting in so much time and effort into this group. I really am happy to see it getting new members and coming alive again. As I told >44 featherbear:...I was the absolutely the last person on the face of the Earth to admin this group. I inherited it in 2020 from the friend that I told I would "help". I don't watch television and I watch very few movies. I think the last movie I watched was in 2018. Thanks again.

Alissa Wilkinson & Emily Stewart. 09/27/2023: The Hollywood writers’ strike is over — and they won big: Here’s what’s coming in the WGA’s new contract.

>50 featherbear: Good news indeed. Creative people should not be sideswiped by AI. Let's hope that this settlement helps the actors who face many of the same issues as the writers.

Lili Loofbourow. WaPo, 09/27/2023: TV is dead! Long live TV?

"The Hollywood strikes haven’t just been negotiating what the next contract (or the fall TV season) is going to look like. They’re part of an existential fight over what television’s next iteration will be.

"The battle is being fought against the backdrop of two seismic shifts: the much-discussed decline of prestige television and the beginning of the end of television’s disruption by streaming services.

"...There will probably be more revivals. More reboots. And, if some executives have their way, a heavier reliance on formulas and algorithms, perhaps assisted by new technologies like AI."

Reminder: Let's Talk About It thread continues to the end of 2023.

>46 KeithChaffee:

Coleman Spilde. Daily Beast, 10/01/2023: ‘Fallen Leaves’: The Gorgeous Finnish Rom-Com Genre Fans Must See.

"Romantic comedies have become a dime a dozen, which means it’s become increasingly difficult to find one that’s more than just decent. There are plenty of films that slap together a collection of tropes, hire a few beautiful or interesting-looking actors, and call it a wrap. But Fallen Leaves, an international selection from Finland that screened Sept. 26 at the New York Film Festival, is primed to invigorate a genre grown stale—and do it in the most deliciously glacial, unassuming way possible."

>54 featherbear: Yes, I've heard the buzz on that one. I don't know Kaurismaki's work at all, so I'm intrigued.

Reminder that while the writers' strike is ended, the actors' strike continues:

Ashley Fetters Maloy. WaPo, 09/30/2023: The New York Film Festival opens with the industry in limbo. "NEW YORK — The New York Film Festival got off to a stylish start Friday night with a party at Central Park’s famed Tavern on the Green — or as stylish as you can get when none of the striking actors in this season’s slate of films are expected to attend." New York downpours didn't help.

Kyle Swenson. WaPo, 10/02/2023: Hattie McDaniel’s missing Oscar is replaced at Howard University.

"In an moment decades in the making, representatives from the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences on Sunday night presented Howard University with a replacement Oscar for Hattie McDaniel’s 1940 best supporting actress award.

"The Oscar — for McDaniel’s performance as “Mammy” in the 1939 big-screen epic “Gone With the Wind” — was the first awarded to a Black actor. As a nod to the significance of that award, McDaniel bequeathed her Oscar to the university before her death in 1952.

"On the night of the ceremony — Feb. 29, 1940 — the nightclub hosting the award banquet would not allow the actress to sit at the same table as her White co-stars.

"Black newspapers and political figures criticized McDaniel’s on-screen role for embracing a racial stereotype. Others attacked the film for presenting a romanticized picture of the antebellum South. The Black newspaper the Chicago Defender blasted the film as a “weapon of terror against Black America.”

The original Oscar went missing sometime in the 1960s or 1970s.

QUESTION #5: Your movie marathon

The proprietor of your local rep house calls and tells you that they're planning a special "Community Month." As one of the community's most beloved lovers of film, you are being invited to program a 4-film marathon. You have free choice of titles -- if it's a real movie and hasn't been completely lost, the theater will show it -- and of themes. Your choice might be as simple as four favorite Bogart movies, or as esoteric as four great German films about bisexual crime-fighting librarians. Your only restriction is that no more than one of your titles can be longer than three hours.

What's your theme? What movies do you choose, and why? Do you have any opinion on the order in which the films are shown?

If you are ambitious and enjoy doing this sort of thing, do feel free to offer more than one possible marathon for our contemplation.

>58 KeithChaffee:
Old age comes to mind; I'd probably show them in chronological order; there are probably other worthy candidates, though it's not a common trope at least in Western movies, but my memory isn't what it used to be; other suggestions? I've provided the directors.
1937 Make Way for Tomorrow (Leo McCarey)
1953 Tokyo Story (Yasujiro Ozu)
1958 Ballad of Narayama (Keisuke Kinoshita; there's a 1983 remake by Shohei Imamura I haven't seen; I'd program it as an extra just so I could view it)
1974 Harry and Tonto (Paul Mazursky; haven't seen this for many years, though)

Lesser known World War 2 movies; more intense than any horror movie, & without any of the heroic moments of Private Ryan:
1956 Attack! (Robert Aldrich)
1959 The Bridge aka Die Brucke (Bernhard Wicki)
1962 Hell Is For Heroes (Don Siegal)
1977 Cross of Iron (Sam Peckinpah; seen this only once years ago, so I'd program it just so I could view it again; possibly not on the same level of intensity as the other 3)

Nice! The old age lineup sounds especially interesting.

Still contemplating another possible idea, but for now, I offer you a lineup of four international films, all of which feature striking visuals.

Ten Canoes (Australia; Rolf de Heer & Peter Djigirr; 2006) -- The first full-length feature to be made entirely in Australian Aboriginal languages. A young man finds himself attracted to the youngest wife of his older brother, who tells him a legend/fable about another young man in the same situation.

Wild Tales (Argentina; Damian Szifron; 2014) -- Six short films on the theme of anger and retribution. The highlight is a road-rage duel that turns into something like a live-action Road Runner cartoon.

Blancanieves (Spain; Pablo Berger; 2012) -- A black-and-white silent retelling of Snow White, with bits of other fairytales thrown in, set against a backdrop of bullfighting in 1920s Seville. Magnificent performance from Maribel Verdu as the stepmother.

Tears of the Black Tiger (Thailand; Wisit Sasanatieng; 2000) -- A young woman reluctantly agrees to her father's demand that she marry the local police chief; her childhood sweetheart is the infamous bandit known as the Black Tiger. The movie is filmed in color so vivid as to make Technicolor look like Whistler's Mother -- the bandits wear turqouise shirts and raspberry ascots; the bride wears a gown of carnation pink; a climactic shootout takes place on the greenest lawn you've ever seen. It's like a collaboration between Douglas Sirk and John Ford .

OK, finished with my alternate possibility -- four animated films based on some sort of myth or legend, sequenced from most kid-friendly to least.

Rango (Gore Verbinski, 2011) -- Surely the Western is part of American mythology? Johnny Depp voices a timid chameleon who wanders into a desert town and winds up as its sheriff, tasked with ridding the place of Rattlesnake Jake (Bill Nighy). Both an homage to and a parody of the classic Western.

ParaNorman (Sam Fell & Chris Butler, 2012) -- No one believes that 11-year-old Norman can talk to ghosts, but when his small Massachusetts town is threatened by an ancient witch's curse, Norman must come to the rescue. A minor bit of historical interest here, as one of the supporting players is the first openly gay character in an animated film.

Wolfwalkers (Thom Moore & Ross Stewart, 2020) -- In 1650, a group of Irish villagers are trying to kill or chase away a pack of wolves from the local forest, under orders from the Lord Protector (never specifically named as Oliver Cromwell, but that's who it is), setting up a distinctly Irish werewolf story.

Sita Sings the Blues (Nina Paley, 2008) -- Scenes from Paley's own life, woven together with scenes from the Indian epic The Ramayana, with musical commentary on both drawn from the recordings of 1930s jazz singer Annette Hanshaw; each layer of the film gets its own animated style, from contemporary "squigglevision" to intricately cut-out shadow puppets.

>58 KeithChaffee:

I enjoy "conversation" movies. Initially, I wanted to do a "girl talk," list -- ensemble women in conversation -- then a one on one male/female, but in both cases I couldn't come up with a fourth -- so I made a single "Conversations" list, again presented in chronological order with director:

1939 The Women (George Cukor)
1969 My Night at Maud's (Eric Rohmer)
1995 Before Sunrise (Richard Linklater)
2007 Death Proof (Quentin Tarantino)

Incomplete combinations -- missing the elusive #4; suggestions welcome:

"Girl Talk"
1939 The Women (Cukor)
2007 Death Proof (Tarantino)
2022 Women Talking (Sarah Polley)

Comment: if this wasn't a "female ensemble" list -- I do enjoy Tarantino's The Hateful Eight; would also break my unwritten rule of no repeat directors, which is why the other Sunrise pix couldn't make the one on one or the combined lists:

"One on One"
1969 My Night at Maud's (Rohmer)
1974 Scenes From a Marriage (Ingmar Bergman)
1995 Before Sunrise (Linklater)

On a completely different note. I doubt Shelley Duvall could have fulfilled a complete TCM Night Under the Stars presentation, but I've always been fond of her beginning with her bit part, largely silent, in McCabe and Mrs. Miller, but she had significant roles in 4 feature films; in this case I have to break the "one director" rule; she was obviously an Altman favorite:

Shelley Duvall in

1974 Thieves Like Us (Robert Altman)
1977 3 Women (Altman)
1980 The Shining (Stanley Kubrick)
1980 Popeye (Altman)

>62 featherbear: To fill out a "Girl Talk" list...

There's always the musical remake of The Women (musical only in the sense that one of the characters has a nightclub act and we hear her sing a few songs). But The Opposite Sex (1956) isn't a very good movie, as its list of stars would suggest. June Allyson, Joan Collins, and Dolores Gray suggests a bad day of being turned down by everyone the casting director actually wanted.

François Ozon's 8 Women (2002), on the other hand, is a delight. Ozon had wanted to do a remake of The Women, but his rights deal fell through, so instead he adapted a French play from the late 1950s, and assembled a stunning cast: Catherine Deneuve, Isabelle Huppert, Emmanuelle Béart, Fanny Ardant, Virginie Ledoyen, Danielle Darrieux, Ludivine Sagnier and Firmine Richard. They are gathered at the isolated family home for Christmas when the patriarch is found stabbed to death; which of them is the killer? And this one really is a musical, with songs that advance the story.

A possible fourth for the "One on One" list: A Love Song (2022). There are a few brief appearances from other characters, but it's basically a two-hander for veteran character actors Dale Dickey and Wes Studi, playing former classmates who meet to see if the spark they once felt for each other might be rekindled. Neither Dickey nor Studi often get to play a starring role, or is thought of as a romantic lead -- this was reportedly the first on-screen kiss for both -- but they are lovely here.

QUESTION #6: Character actors!

My most recently finished book (Celeste Holm Syndrome by David Lazar) was a bit of a disappointment, but it did start me thinking about character actors, those useful utility players who fill out the supporting cast of a movie.

What exactly is a character actor, anyway? Who are your favorite character actors, past or present?

>64 KeithChaffee: It's confusing. If I understand correctly, during the studio system period, a character actor was indeed always in a supporting role, who tended to play a certain "type," e.g. Eugene Pallette or Walter Brennan. On the other hand, post-studio, I get the impression an actor who was adept at playing different characters, without necessarily playing a supporting role, got the "character" label; Philip Seymour Hoffman seems to have been categorized as such, while Tom Cruise never. Not sure where this puts the Method types like Brando or DeNiro. If Hoffman counts, he'd be my modern favorite.

>65 featherbear: If forced to offer a definition, I'd say that a character actor is someone who can create a memorable character with limited screen time. I think they've always come in the two types you suggest -- the actor who plays the same basic character every time, and the actor who seems to have no particularly distinct personality of their own, but disappears into whatever new role they're asked to play. In the 1940s, for instance, William Demarest was the first type; Celeste Holm was the second.

I'll pick one recent favorite of each type. Margo Martindale is a relative chameleon. There are certainly traits in common to most of her characters -- a blunt practicality, a down-to-earth quality -- but she can range from the villainy of Mags Bennett on Justified to the goodness of the mother superior on Mrs. Davis. Her filmography includes titles as varied as The Rocketeer, August: Osage County, and Cocaine Bear.

On the other hand, Leslie Jordan really only had one character in his toolbox -- the sharp-tongued Southern queen -- but he played that one character to perfection. There were variations -- his Will & Grace character was smarter and meaner; his character in the ensemble sitcom The Cool Kids was sweeter and a bit more befuddled -- but when he showed up, you knew basically what to expect.

Mark Sweney. Guardian, 10/15/2023: Disney execs consider radical shake-up as crisis hits centenary celebrations.

QUESTION #7: Remakes!

Before the year is over, we'll be getting a second film version of The Color Purple (this one based on the musical) and a third version of the Willy Wonka story. Hardly a month goes by without the announcement of plans to remake some beloved movie or other.

Do you have favorite remakes? What makes a remake worthwhile? Which movies should (or shouldn't) be remade? Is there any movie you'd like to see a new version of?

>68 KeithChaffee: I’m in a minority in liking the 1994 remake of The Getaway (1972, Sam Peckinpah). Director was Roger Donaldson, who's had a rather spotty track record, but he does have No Way Out (1987) & Cadillac Man (1990) to his credit. The original film is better (Quentin Tarantino has high praise in his Cinema Speculation), but I prefer Kim Basinger’s performance to Ali McGraw’s. I’ve only seen the 1992 Last of the Mohicans, but I suspect I’d prefer it to the 1936 version. Then there’s Akira Kurosawa’s Yojimbo (1961), remade by Sergio Leone as A Fistful of Dollars (1964) and remade by Walter Hill as Last Man Standing (1996). To my mind, the Western remakes of Kurosawa’s Seven Samurai (1954) -- John Sturges’s The Magnificent Seven (1964) & Antoine Fuqua’s version (2016) -- aren’t in the same league. I think the Yojimbo remakes work better for me because the Japanese original has strong genre roots, and the remakes stay within genre boundaries. Seven Samurai is intended as more than a genre film while the remakes don’t go beyond genre.

Two films that shouldn’t be remade would be Disney’s Song of the South & D.W. Griffith’s Birth of a Nation. For that matter, I don’t think we need a remake of Gone with the Wind, even in the form of a musical.

Tarantino has an essay on Paul Schrader’s Hardcore (1979) as a remake of John Ford’s The Searchers (1979), where the issue of the racist quest is addressed. Too soon at this moment in time, but I could foresee a future film revisiting The Searchers in the 21st century within the context of the Hamas massacre aftermath.

Xan Brooks. Guardian, 10/16/2023: ‘Rejecting hatred and fear’: why Powell and Pressburger’s weird, confounding films are perfect for our times.

On the subject of remakes, I have always generally agreed with Roger Ebert's idea that if you're going to remake a movie, don't remake one that was done right the first time. No one needs a new version of Casablanca or Pulp Fiction. The movies to remake are the ones that almost worked; figure out what the problem was, and fix it.

The exception, I would argue, is foreign-language films; given the historic reluctance of most American moviegoers to foreign films -- what Bong Joon-Ho called the "one-inch barrier" of subtitles -- there might be good reason to remake even the very best foreign films, if you can do so well, as a way of getting at least some part of their brilliance to a new audience.

It is interesting how differently the idea of revisiting the classics is seen in the worlds of film and theater. One doesn't "remake" a play; one "revives" it, using exactly the same script. And audiences are thrilled at the opportunity to see a new cast tackle the same roles. Could you do that with movies? Use the same script to make a new Silence of the Lambs, say, with Emma Stone and Edward Norton in the Foster and Hopkins roles?

Probably not, and the crucial difference is that movies endure and remain available in a way that stage performances do not. Today's audiences can never see Jessica Tandy's Blanche Dubois; if they want the thrill of seeing that role on stage, a revival is the only way to do it. But Foster's Clarice Starling lives forever, easily accessible to anyone who wants to see it. The few times that anyone has attempted something like a "revival" in film, the reaction has generally been awful; Gus Van Sant's Psycho comes to mind.

>71 KeithChaffee: I agree with you. Don't remake a classic! I just saw the live version of The Little Mermaid and I wasn't impressed plus it was too long. I loved the original Disney animated film.

>68 KeithChaffee: & 71> I'm pretty sure there was a Hollywood re-make of Rashomon. Anyone recall what it was?

There have been dozens of movies and TV episodes inspired by the basic idea of Rashomon -- a single event told by each of the participants -- and there's a long list of them at Wikipedia:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rashomon#Remakes_and_adaptations

Looks as if the most direct remake is probably Martin Ritt's 1964 western The Outrage, with the intriguing cast of Paul Newman, Laurence Harvey, Claire Bloom, Edward G. Robinson, and William Shatner.

>74 KeithChaffee: The Outrage! That's the one I was groping for! Thanks; I need to check out at some point.

>71 KeithChaffee: Regarding the one inch barrier of subtitles ... Interesting that the early history of films used intertitles to help the audience when the purely visual was inadequate, but reading is now used to explain why some folks won't watch foreign films (don't you want to know what those foreigners are saying?) though it's become a truism nowadays that people (not just us boomers) make use of closed-captioning because actors too often mumble their lines (not the case in the studio days, when they sometimes just talked VERY FAST -- looking at you Front Page); though as a dedicated watcher of Midsomer Murders with CC, I'm sometimes distracted by the gawdawful misspellings of the captioners. Don't understand why they can't caption with a script in hand, and then work around the actor/director emendations. Is that so much to ask??! Or is CC done by AI these days, based simply on poor voice recognition?

Random thought: I believe in Hollywood the oral history one of the interviewees from the silent era recalled changing a drama to a comedy simply by changing the intertitles. In the sound era, I thought of Woody Allen's What's Up Tiger Lily? for the use of subtitles for a comic effect. Were there any more such usages?

>72 JulieLill: JulieLill! Hello! I had begun to fear that featherbear and I were the only ones still reading this topic.

>76 featherbear: I can't think of any other examples specifically involving subtitles, but there are a variety of other uses of old footage in new films. Dead Men Don't Wear Plaid comes to mind, for instance, and there are several films and TV shows in which (like Allen's Tiger Lily) new dialogue is dubbed over existing footage.

>48 KeithChaffee: Hi Keith, was browsing my groups and realised I hadn't been here in a while.. Glade to see all the activity Like the idea of Avid Watcher, Ill have to catch up and answer the questions

I love silent movies (metropolis and sunrise probably my favs) animation and yes about Pixar; they rarely miss. ET and Coco were great, still love Toy Story. dISNEY has to be lion king. fav romcom is probably when harry met sally, and french kiss. Also love musicals: Oliver, My Fair Lady need to think about newer ones Fav indie King of Hearts is the first to come to mind

"There is very often a moment in a romcom where the plot hinges on whether Partner A will be able to contact Partner B in time to stop them from (leaving, making a crucial mistake, saying the wrong thing to person C...); the cell phone essentially eliminates the "how do I reach them?" crisis.'

Watching older movies often makes me thing "for want of a cell phone"

.

sorry wrong thread

>74 KeithChaffee: Im not a fan of remakes, but you know you are right about plays; since the bards time they have been revised again and again. but since movies have stayed with us, remakes feel like more of the same'

One of the best remakes was the new little women I loved it as a kid and was hesitant to try it. But it turned out great. not only did they not mess with the plot but they updated it to make it in more real to us. The ending was pure genius

and dont get me started on cloud atlas one of my all time fav books. Great cast but they just made a huge mess of it.

>76 featherbear: like you im a big fan of captions because I cant understant the actors. And I also dont get the mispellings; youd think with technology theyd be able to make them work better

>81 cindydavid4: I really liked the Greta Gerwig version; was that the one you were referring to?

yes! I always loved the one with Katherine Hepburn, but this updated it in a way that made sense

Zach Schonfeld. Guardian, 10/24/2023: Even the French are giving up on arthouse films. Is this the end of a cinematic era?

A little late with this week's question, but here goes:

QUESTION #8: Books to movies!

This is Library Thing, after all, so we had to get here eventually. Do you have favorite movies adapted from books? Are there certain types of books that you think adapt to film better than others? What book are you wishing someone would make a movie of?

>86 KeithChaffee: Movies based on books is tricky in part because there are so many to choose from & because one may not be aware that a movie was based on a book. Anyway thanks for interfering with my sleep the previous night as I tossed & turned.

I believe it was in high school I first encountered the Charles Laughton directed Night of the Hunter (1955) -- on TV, alone late at night, rest of the family was still asleep. Out of context, tuned in when Mitchum was toying with then pursuing the children down to the river. Wanted to find out what I'd missed & bought a paperback of the novel by Davis Grubb, which as I recall filled in the blanks with a hallucinatory tone that I still recall.

Also encountered -- in this case numerous times -- always alone, since it was usually on TV late at night -- I remember one time during the holidays when everyone had gone home, alone in the graduate school lounge -- A Christmas Carol (1951, aka Scrooge); this is the one with Alastair Sim. The loneliness of Scrooge struck a nerve with me, heightened by the viewing occasion. Read the novel/novella several times over the years, eventually wrote my dissertation on Dickens.

The Shining (1980), directed by Stanley Kubrick. Identified with the Jack Nicholson character recalling my struggles with writing said dissertation, though I couldn't imagine having a family like Shelley Duvall & Danny Lloyd much less hurting them. Eventually read the Stephen King novel (a used paperback with a yellow cover); hardly remember the novel, though I generally like his novels & sometimes think of him as the Dickens we deserve.

Le Plasir (1952). In this case I had read a translation of Guy de Maupassant's short novel/story (?) La Maison Tellier in a Modern Library collection before seeing the film, and when I eventually watched the Max Ophuls movie some time later -- an anthology with La Maison at the center -- I had a kind of mild shock of recognition since it seemed familiar/non familiar. The story moved me -- the madam of a brothel temporarily closes up to attend the marriage of a relative in the country, and takes her employees with her. Maupassant humanizes the women who would have been the equivalent of untouchables in the Victorian novels with which I was familiar, and Ophuls does justice to the original. The image of the windows being closed at night after the brothel reopens lingers (or are the windows being reopened? Can't remember).

In the best of all possible worlds, movies wouldn't be based on -- subtenants of -- books; movies would converse with (not remake) other movies, and books would be part of the visual furniture or thematic content (bookcase crashes down on obsessive graduate student) of cinema. But in the real world of movies, films based on books are inextricably part of the landscape, though wishing a book would become a movie seems like a curse, a "be careful what you wish for" spell. So pardon me if I don't.

>86 KeithChaffee: I just thought of 2 other books into films worth noting. The Leopard (aka Il gattopardo, 1963). Director Luchino Visconti. Read the book (same title) last year & it’s good. Haven’t seen the film in some time, though, but I recall being very impressed. Book & movie are both worth experiencing; movie features Burt Lancaster as an Italian prince at a time when the Sicilian aristocracy is being superseded by the bourgeoisie, & how he connives to make sure his nephew marries into the up and coming commercial class. The other film is Letter from an Unknown Woman (1948), another Max Ophuls movie, one I’m still thinking about – read the Stefan Zweig novella on which it was based this year. One of the most impressive movies I’d seen during my VHS rental days; been rewatching it on a Bluray disk recently. Still thinking about it. Joan Fontaine & Louis Jourdan.

No one has nominated The Wizard of Oz?! I notice that Criterion Channel has an entire documentary on how all of David Lynch’s oeuvre (Eraserhead, Blue Velvet, Mulholland Drive, Twin Peaks etc etc) all reflect his obsession with Wizard -- the movie, probably not the book. When I get a minute …

I mentioned earlier that it’s sometimes easy to overlook the fact that a movie is based on a book. I just re-watched Sam Peckinpah’s Cross of Iron (1977) on Amazon Prime – at 128 min. perhaps a longer version than the one I saw originally in Honolulu in the theater. It’s based on a book by Willi Heinrich, which I’ve never heard of. Odd combination of Howard Hawks & Robert Aldrich – the movie anyway. No idea how Peckinpah or his screenwriters adapted or messed with the book, but some of the bits -- the deguelo singalongs (but in German of course), the slomo & freeze frames, the laughter in the face of death, women & men in hot tubs -- all seem to be Wild Bunch call outs*. (Cross has James Coburn, Maximillian Schell & James Mason as Wehrmacht on the Russian front near the end of WWII)

On TCM (but available via other sources) started but might not finish Of Mice and Men (1939), mostly to catch Burgess Meredith’s performance; director Lewis Milestone, & based on the short novel by John Steinbeck everyone used to read in high school. The Aaron Copland music has so far seemed a little overbearing; I did like how the creators use cowboy regular Bob Steele as a bully motivated by feelings of inferiority over his short stature. Sort of nervous about those puppies. Steinbeck movies! East of Eden, Grapes ...

*Left out of the Wild Bunch call out list: the kids feeding the scorpion to the ants in the opening echoed by the Nazi children's chorus in the opening credits of Cross.

So I read an article about Meg Ryan and David Duchnovys new movie "what happens later this is her second time directing and it looks good. I was curious about her first time directing and looked up "Ithaca" with Tom Hanks. Looks like it bombed. based on William Saroyan's 1943 novel The Human Comedy, which Ive never read but have read several of his others. So anyone know about the book or movie? comments? And if a movie stars Ryan and Hanks, could it really be that bad? *

*I kno it can, hanks was in 'Cloud Atlas' a miserable movie adaptation of a great book

>87 featherbear: "wishing a book would become a movie seems like a curse, a "be careful what you wish for" spell. So pardon me if I don't."

Pardon me if I do, after another bad night. Leigh Bardugo, the YA author, has written 2 horror/supernatural novels taking place in New Haven. I've read the first, Ninth House, set in the 90s, probably when she was at school at the local uni, when the shop around the corner of York & Broadway was a WaWa, the corner store was a Rosenberg's cheaper-than-J-Press suit store -- heroine lives above the retail store where the tailoring was actually done IRL. Rosenberg's was next door to the Yankee Doodle luncheonette sorely missed, where I sometimes breakfasted on the way to work. Enjoyable big nostalgia hit for me. The sequel, Hell Bent, I have not read, but concerns the mouth of Hades opening below the university library where I spent my career cataloging. Doubt it could ever be plausibly made into a movie since the university jealously protects its brand & wouldn't permit photography, but I can dream. That libraries are the gateway to the bad place has become a popular trope these days.

On book-to-movie adaptation: I've never had much use for "they've ruined the book" grumbling when a new adaptation comes out. No, they haven't; the book is still sitting right there and you can read it any time you like.

Beyond that, I'm largely agnostic on the question. Some books are turned into good movies and some are turned into bad movies. I don't think the success or failure has much to do with the book itself. Like any movie, it's all about whether that magical thing happens where everything just works -- the right cast, the right script, the right director.

I suppose the books that are most likely to be entertaining movies are those heavier on plot; hard to imagine making a riveting movie out of something that's mostly internal monologue (though there are moments when a good actor can convey three paragraphs of "he thought about" with a single facial expression).

finally got some time to give this some thought

?1 favorite movie "King of Hearts" "the grave of fireflies" "the secret of Roan Irish" "night at the opera" "the front" "when harry met sally"

?2 who do you love Tom Hanks Meryl Streep, Glen Close, Amy Adams, George Clooney Kat Blanchett, Judy Dench, Maggie Smith, Colin Firth

?3 On your own Island See ?1 the first three of those. Waking Ned Devine, Prescilla, queen of the desert, Harold and Maude

?4 Romantic Comedy when harry met sally, princess bride, French Kiss, shakespear in love, Notting Hill

?5 Movie Marathon: all the movies directed by Mel Brooks

?6 Character actors not sure, Im awful with actor names; but Ill recognize them

?7 remakes I generally dislike remakes with some exceptions: the new Little Women was brillant . Another adjacent ? would be spoofs: young frankenstien, airplane, top secret, Hot shots part deus,Holy Grail, Dead Men Dont Wear Plaid

?8 favorite movie adaptation: Little Women, "The Man Who Would Be King"."Sleuth" "one Flew Over the Cuckoos Nest":

QUESTION #9: Intermission!

Martin Scorsese's Killers of the Flower Moon is just under 3 1/2 hours long, and audiences are grumbling that they need a pee break. The studio has been stomping down on a few theaters who have added an intermission of their own to the movie, and some fans have decided they'll just wait for the movie to arrive at Apple TV+, so they can hit pause whenever they like.

Do you remember the glory days of intermissions? As movies get longer, do we need to bring them back?

>93 KeithChaffee: Years ago they had a revival of Gone With The Wind at the local movie theater and that had an intermission. If movie is going to be longer than 3 hours I say go ahead and have an intermission!

i remember the intermissions back in the day. I agree about over 3 hours for an intermission, but not sure how that would work with all the cgi and action in many movies: where would you stop the movie? In fact thinking about it if I am really into a movie, an intermission would put me off, as any interruption from reading a book will not be appreciated

This debate is being acted upon here in the UK. The 'Vue' chain are reintroducing them.
Here is a link to an interesting article onthe subject.
https://bnn.network/arts/the-revival-of-cinema-intermissions-a-pause-for-comfort...

>95 cindydavid4: "I agree about over 3 hours for an intermission, but not sure how that would work with all the cgi and action in many movies: where would you stop the movie?"

Back in the days when intermissions were a thing, movies were made with that in mind. Just as TV episodes are structured around commercial breaks, a movie can be structured to build to a good pause point. But I'd agree with Scorsese and the studio that just adding an intermission to a movie that wasn't made with one in mind is going to be disruptive to the flow of the movie, and shouldn't be done.

I can understand why theaters would want to, though. With a three hour movie, adding a 15-minute intermission isn't going to cut a screening out of your day, so you don't lose any box office. And you give everyone a chance to make a return visit to the snack bar, which is where theaters reportedly make most of their money.

One interesting theory for why movies have gotten so much longer in recent years has to do with digital projection. It used to be that movies had to be physically shipped to theaters. The number of film reels that would fit into the standard shipping box allowed for a movie of up to 100 minutes or so; a movie longer than that would require two boxes, doubling the shipping costs. But now that everything's done digitally, it doesn't cost any more to deliver a 210-minute movie to the theater than it does to deliver a 90-minute movie, so directors are given more leeway to stretch/bloat their movies.

>93 KeithChaffee: When TCM screens long movies from bygone days, they will sometimes include the intermission screenshot with the original musical accompaniment. At my age with my fleeting attention span I need intermissions when I'm reading books -- jump to another book, or watch something on TV, go to the bathroom, whatever -- & I do this as well with movies, whether streaming, DVD, or cable. The worst part of streaming w/commercials is you can't fast forward or switch channels to wait it out, & the experience of watching the same Sensodyne commercial every 10 min can cause the tooth grinding that will require the toothpaste.

>98 featherbear: "I need intermissions when I'm reading books -- jump to another book, or watch something on TV, go to the bathroom, whatever -- & I do this as well with movies, whether streaming, DVD, or cable."

I wonder if this might not be a small piece of the puzzle in the relative slowness of the movie theater bounceback after the COVID shutdowns. As the average movie length continues to grow, people would rather watch at home, where they have more control over taking bathroom breaks, or even watching long movies in multiple sessions. I remember when The Irishman was released at Netflix, several websites offered "miniseries" timings for viewing, telling you where the best places were to break the movie into three manageable chunks.

Sounds like a marketable app, maybe; a "where to break" listing for any movie over 2 hours long.

Off topic, but I've been listening to a playlist of Leonard Bernstein's first run through of Mahler's symphonies & the bathos, serenity, sublimity, grotesquerie and everything else strike me as the Platonic accompaniment to silent movie drama. Visions of Lilian Gish as a Mahler adagio sails by into the sunset.

Erica Werner. WaPo, 11/02/2023: Disney to acquire all of Hulu, heralding more mergers, higher prices.

"Acquiring Hulu gives Disney a streaming service aimed at adults, as opposed to Disney Plus, which caters to younger viewers. The move had been considered likely based on recent comments from Disney CEO Bob Iger. Disney faced a deadline to acquire its remaining stake of Hulu from Comcast or sell it."

Michael Schulman. New Yorker, 10/30/2023: The Twilight of Prestige Television. Review of: Pandora's Box: How Guts, Guile, and Greed Upended TV / Peter Biskind -- Burn It Down: Power, Complicity, and a Call for Change in Hollywood / Maureen Ryan.

QUESTION #10: What are you looking forward to?

We're well into "Awards Season," with serious Oscar contenders now playing in theaters and on assorted streaming services. Which of the Big! Exciting! Movies! of the year are you most eager to see?

>103 KeithChaffee: The first one that came to mind for me is Killers of the Flower Moon, having read the book a few years ago. But I am eager to add to my watch list from the recommendations that will show up here.

>103 KeithChaffee: I started watching Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse on Netflix. The animation is truly dazzling, but the human stories (Spider-Teen might be more appropriate) seemed trite, & I'm not sure if anything interesting is made of the multiverse background. Don't know whether I'll finish it, but Variety thinks it might get a nomination due to its financial success.

Another potential award winner might be Eo by Jerzy Skolimowski; technically a 2022 feature, but I've seen it on 2023 lists. Arguably a very free "re-make" of Au Hasard Balthazar by Robert Bresson, but it seemed more like a donkey's eye view of contemporary Eastern Europe. Cinematic donkeys retrospective festival: Balthazar, Eo, Shrek and the elusive #4 -- Time Out cites 2 other donkey films, though: Banshees of Inisherin & Triangle of Sadness. Started Banshees without thought of the donkey list, but haven't finished it. Does Banshees qualify for 2023 nominations?

Sometimes I think I'm too old to look forward to seeing "the latest" -- I'm more eager to catch up on the films I missed in my younger days before I become the latest -- films often suggested by Peter Bogdanovich's interviews with his auteur heroes. But with regard to the cinematic latest ... Tar was available on a couple of streaming services but I couldn't get off the schneid; not sure if I'll have to rent, apparently it has appeal for codgers & geezers. Barbie the Movie might turn up on HBO/MAX before the end of the year; doesn't seem like something I'd like, but Greta Gerwig has done some interesting things, e.g. Little Women, so you never know. I've seen another animation film, Cameron's Avatar: the way of water all the way through, but the trite eco-philosophy & anthropology seemed a more college level version of the Spider-Man movie; hard to get into that mindset. I've liked most of the Christopher Nolan movies I've seen, but bio-pics usually aren't my cup of tea; will probably catch Oppenheimer streaming or on cable when it becomes available. I have debated whether I could sit through Scorsese's Killers of the Flower Moon in a theater, but I haven't yet gotten through The Irishman on Netflix! I'm still very much behind on Scorsese catch-up watching. The one with the missionaries in Japan is still in my streaming queue.

Possible future list discussion? For people of a certain age ... Films you missed when they came out that you'd still like to watch at some point. Or, films you can't remember you watched till you re-watched them -- this just happened to me with Edgar Ulmer's The Black Cat. Recently watched Laura all the way to the end, but honestly couldn't remember whether I'd ever watched it all the way through before.

Movies I'm looking forward to:

American Fiction, an adaptation of the Percival Everett novel Erasure, starring Jeffrey Wright

May December, the latest from Todd Haynes

Rustin, a Bayard Rustin bio starring Colman Domingo

All of Us Strangers, a gay romance/ghost story from Andrew Haigh (his movies Weekend and 45 Years are overlooked gems worth looking for).

Currently in theaters, and deserving the awards buzz they're getting:

Scorsese's Killers of the Flower Moon (it is long, and I felt every minute of it, but Lily Gladstone and Robert De Niro are both superb)

Alexander Payne's The Holdovers (I always want to call it either The Leftovers or The Hangovers)

Justine Triet's courtroom drama/marital drama Anatomy of a Fall.

Worth catching from earlier in the year, though the Academy will ignore most of them:

Afire
Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret
Asteroid City
Barbie
The Blue Caftan
Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves
Elemental
Jules
The Lesson
Oppenheimer
Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse
Theater Camp
A Thousand and One
You Hurt My Feelings

I was looking forward to watching all the light we cannot see The adaptation is streaming, and for much of it makes the book come alive. Then the last episode, that was an absolute mess, old fashioned villany, soap opera dialogem. Many reviews noted that 4 episodes were not enough to tell this story and I agree.really to bad ...Ill let this critic tell it :

"Nothing about this final product suggests that Levy or Knight were the right choice to bring this story to the screen. Their vision for Doerr's novel is shallow, messy, and, most unfortunately, instantly forgettable." rogerebert.com

on the plus side, the two young actors who played Maria were just perfect. I hope to see them again

I haven't been able to watch either all the way through so I can't attest to their classicism. I could see watching a John Wick movie with a holiday theme. The Harold & Kumar Christmas movie was OK, as I recall.

Esther Zuckerman. NYT, 11/04/2023: Are ‘Elf’ and ‘Love Actually’ the Last Holiday Classics We’ll Ever Get? "With a few exceptions — like 2019’s “Last Christmas,” based on the Wham! song — there doesn’t seem to be much of a home for holiday entertainment in theaters, unless it is somehow profane or bloody."

>108 featherbear: One reason there've been no new holiday classics that the article doesn't mention is the death of the monoculture, which has changed all media. Nothing on television will ever again be as universally watched as the M*A*S*H finale; no musical act will ever dominate the landscape the way that the Beatles or Michael Jackson did at their peaks. Everything is microtargeted to its specific niche, and "success" is both smaller and shorter-lived than it used to be. Andy Warhol told us(*) that everyone would be famous for 15 minutes; we're now learning that he should have added "but for no longer."

(*-- Actually, Warhol didn't tell us that. The line was fabricated for the catalog of a museum exhibition of Warhol's work by the curator and the catalog author.)

QUESTION #11: Old movies!

Every so often, we see an alarmist article decrying the unwillingness of Those Kids Today to watch older movies. "They won't watch anything more than ten years old," comes the cry, "and they certainly won't watch anything in black and white."

What's your relationship to movies from the past? Do you think there really is less interest in older movies these days? Do you have a few favorite oldies that stir warm nostalgic feelings? Do you actively seek out the classics, or hunt down fascinating obscurities? Or are you busy enough keeping up with what's new to spend much time on movie history?

Looking back at age 74, 2 significant influences in my cinematic viewing were college in New York, 1967-1971, with the many revival houses & their relative openness to international films, & a (college) course with film critic Andrew Sarris, who stressed the history of film as the foundation of appreciating contemporary movies. As a graduate student & then a career in libraries in New Haven (1971-), I was somewhat cut off from the latest Hollywood films, since these played at a complex in the inaccessible suburbs; most of these I watched as re-runs & revivals; the only first run theater in town, which eventually closed, skewed toward "art house" (where I watched & rewatched Barry Lyndon, Mean Streets, & Altman movies, especially The Long Goodbye). Caught a lot of blaxploitation & B-movies at the downtown theaters, when they still existed, however. Also a little skewed because I didn't own a TV until the early 90's. And then I got a VCR ... but that mostly fed my exploration of the past -- the 30's, the 50's, the 80's. I like an action movie, but the "Big Tent" pix I mostly caught on the odd trip to New York, e.g. Mad Max 2, Aliens, & Star Wars.

Marvel comics were not part of my childhood, and probably most of the recent hits are based on childhood fandom that postdated my youth. Always startles me to see folks reminiscing about films of the 80's, 90's, 2000's -- maybe having such a long period of life on my part to watch this & that weakens the emotional hold of nostalgia. My childhood was in Honolulu, a relative wasteland for American movies (Ben-Hur) played at the local prestige theater for over a year,) but with its large Japanese-American demographic, I was able to watch a number of samurai movies & even artier Kurosawa stuff back then (Honolulu then as I believe now had a Japanese language TV channel w/Japanese language serials & revivals of old films).

I like both old & new films, but at my age, especially with so many books to be read, I don't feel compelled to seek out the latest thing people are talking about. Also distracting to have access to so many streaming services that provide ready access to film history. For the most part, I'm not into Young Adult fare or rom-coms; old age, I 'spect. Recently caught parts of Captain Marvel on TV & found the convoluted plot intriguing -- I could see watching the whole thing; on the other hand, the 2023 Spiderman currently streaming on Netflix just had too many Young Adult tropes to compensate for the extraordinary animation.

"To tie in with its Powell and Pressburger season, the BFI have mounted an exhibition focusing on the celebrated 1948 ballet movie, drawing on a wealth of material preserved by the BFI National Archive, including around 100 unseen costume and production designs by Hein Heckroth and Ivor Beddoes."

Guardian, 11/13/2023: The Red Shoes: behind the scenes of the classic Powell and Pressburger film – in pictures.

>110 KeithChaffee: I love all movies but I especially like the older films. I have been recently watching several of Hitchcock's films. Last night I watched John Wayne's 1947 movie Angel and The Badman. Our library system has over 100 libraries so I can get most movies I requested, and we can also order books and movies out of our system.

I like old movies, and I have a "I'm never going to be able to watch all of these" spreadsheet of movies I'd like to see -- the Oscar nominees I've missed, and a bunch of random stuff that I've added because I like the star (the director, the genre...) or because someone I trust recommended it.

I didn't really get to discover movies as a kid. The nearest theater was a 30-minute drive away, and neither of my parents were moviegoers. Things got a little better in college, but those are busy years, and there's not always a lot of time to get to the theater.

So it wasn't until I finished grad school and moved to Los Angeles that I could really dive into the world of movies. Finally, I had time and plenty of theaters that I could easily get to! So my knowledge of mainstream cinema is fairly comprehensive from the 90s on, but there are lots of weird gaps in the late 70s and the 80s that you wouldn't expect for a person my age.

So every month, I check the TCM schedule and the "new on Criterion Channel this month" list, checking to see what's coming up that isn't readily available on some screening service so that I can make a point of getting to it while it's there.

I love going to the movies, but the film industry has changed so in the last twenty years that I go less often than I once did. The mid-budget adult drama has largely disappeared, and I gave up on the Marvel Entertainment Empire several years ago, when I realized that every new movie was going to require homework in the form of catching up with the two movies and three TV series that were its precursors.

So a higher percentage of my movie diet these days is older movies, and I'm perfectly happy with that.

>114 KeithChaffee: In recent years, the A24 production/distribution company seems to greenlight a lot of interesting midbudget indie American (mostly) films; A24s I've seen get buried in the large cinema databases of TV/streaming aggregators like HBO/MAX, Showtime, MGM+ & so on -- probably Hulu also, though I don't subscribe. Can't remember whether it was HBO or Showtime that I caught Claire Denis's High Life, kind of like a French Tarkovsky film, about a crew of misfits sent on an experimental (i.e. suicidal) mission to harvest energy from a black hole & to see if they could produce offspring that could survive cosmic radiation. There must be a list of A24s floating around in the Internet ether somewhere. Yes! Good old Wikipedia!

Yeah, A24 is beloved these days. There are some fine movies on that list (The Farewell, The Tragedy of Macbeth), but when they're bad, they're very bad (The Whale, which skips past "bad" and goes straight to "morally repulsive"), and they are too often overpraised for nice competent movies (Past Lives, C'mon C'mon, Minari) that are treated as Major! Cinematic! Events!

Melanie McFarland. Salon, 11/17/2023: Is the poor box office showing for "The Marvels" because it's made for the youths? OK, Boomer.

I'm unable to decipher the headline, even though I've read much of the article.

QUESTION 12: Question of the week?

So this experiment has been going on for about three months now, and my sense of it is that it's not accomplishing much. There are only three or four people responding to most questions, and it's pretty much the same small group. I think that this particular LT Group just doesn't have the critical mass of active participants needed to generate more lively discussion. And maybe that's not surprising; LT is principally a book forum, after all.

Any thoughts?

>118 KeithChaffee: I hate to be the person who only chimes in when something is in danger of going away, but I will say that I always read the QotW and think a lot about what my answer would be. I just haven't ever gotten around to typing it in and hitting Post. If you decide to continue, I promise I'll make more of an effort to actually contribute.

>118 KeithChaffee: Questions I'd be interested in? Popular or critically acclaimed films or TV series missed when they came out & feeling a little guilty about never getting around to watching; classic films you've never gotten around to viewing (not quite the same thing -- these could have been released well before you started watching movies). Feel like piling on the guilt this week! Oh, & #3: great movies you've seen but haven't had a chance to re-watch! The thing is other people's lists always turn up something overlooked or forgotten, so they can be helpful for the movie/TV fan. I'd completely forgotten about Moonlighting.

For me, category 1: Once Upon a Time in Hollywood; the TV series The Wire & the 2nd half of the Game of Throne series (too chicken to watch the blood wedding episode); and all those A24 movies I never get around to catching though keeping my fingers crossed; can't even remember what's in my Netflix, Amazon Prime, & Criterion Channel queues. And as noted above, Moonlighting on (inaccessible for me) Hulu.

category 2: Spartacus (I'm pretty sure this came out after I was born, but still ...) -- then there's the subcategory of movies I can't remember whether I've seen or not: The 10 Commandments? Gun Crazy?

category 3: I haven't had a chance to re-watch Tokyo Story. Yet. And I'd like to take another look at Weekend & The Bride of Frankenstein & Detour, & the TV series Orphan Black ...

In TCM news (via X/Twitter), "host & executive producer of HGTV’s Celebrity IOU, Jonathan Scott joins us as Guest Programmer to discuss his favorite classics with TCM host Dave Karger." Discovery+, home of HGTV & other "reality" programs, took over HBO/MAX, which included TCM. Mr Blandings Builds His Dream House in the queue?

>121 featherbear: Mr. Scott has chosen three films for his evening of guest programming: Russian Roulette, a 1975 British/Canadian thriller starring George Segal; and a pair of better-known titles, The Parallax View and Being There.

Ann Hornaday. WaPo, 11/21/2023: Each generation is defined by its movies. Here are 57 that shaped me. "Too young for ‘The Graduate’? Too old for John Hughes? Your cinematic touchstones might be as quirky as mine."

Oh Im enjoying these; there are other movie threads here mainly about books to movies maybe make an announcnnement on those, inviting them to join us. Or ask LT to do the same (if people dont know we are here they dont have a reason to)

Re old movies: saw a ton of them when they werent so old on tv many times, it was always a treat for our family to watch them. Loved Marx brothers movies It was in college that I got to explore further, with the New Loft theatre near the university that had regular classic movie night. also saw a lot of indie movies like King of Hearts or Grave of the Firefly. also saw a few silents that got me started looking for them at the video stores, then discovering TCM which opened my worlld up to them.I misss tv shows about movies like Siskell and Ebert. granted they werent older films but it gave me a chance to check out what was playing

Just thought of something. We have Avid Reader. Change the title to Avid Watcher or something like that.

>122 KeithChaffee: I need to watch The Parallax View again. Our library system has a few copies - yes!

"French critics considered Ridley Scott’s new biopic lazy, pointless, boring, migraine-inducing, too short and historically inaccurate. And that’s just to start."

Catherine Porter. NYT, 11/24/2023: France Scoffs at an Englishman’s ‘Napoleon.’

Here's another French opinion:

Agnès Poirier. Guardian, 11/24/2023: Like the rest of France, I couldn’t wait for Ridley Scott’s Napoleon. Then I actually saw it.

Articles keep piling up; I'm enjoying it:

Adam Gopnick. New Yorker, 11/29/2023: The French Are Not Happy About “Napoleon.”

Richard Brody. New Yorker, 12/01/2023: The Best Movies of 2023. Brody's 20 best. Probably paywalled, so here's the list -- numbered, though I'm not sure what this implies, if anything -- I added some notes since many of them aren't familiar to me.

1. Killers of the Flower Moon (which he likens to Eyes Wide Shut for what it's worth
2. Asteroid City
3. Barbie
4. All Dirt Roads Taste of Salt: "Spanning half a century in the life of a woman in rural Mississippi, Raven Jackson’s first feature unites family lore and the legacy of history with a breathtaking romantic melodrama"
5. Showing Up: "a sculptor preparing her work for a show while also working at an art school, Kelly Reichardt explores the bonds and the conflicts of a tight-knit community"
6. Passages: "Ira Sachs’s turbulent melodrama set in Paris—in which a German movie director married to a British man embarks on a reckless romance with a French woman"
7. Civic: "a young man’s return home (to South Central Los Angeles)" (20 min. feature)
8. A Thousand and One: "two decades in the life of a mother and child in Harlem"
9. Earth Mama: "Savanah Leaf’s début feature, the drama of a young woman’s fervent efforts to regain custody of her children and to maintain a bond with her newborn"
10. Pinball: the man who saved the game: documentary of the legalization of pinball in NY
11. The Wonderful World of Henry Sugar - The Swan - The Ratcatcher - Poison: Wes Anderson adaptations of Roald Dahl children's stories on Netflix
12. Menus plaisirs - Les Troigros: Frederick Wiseman doc about a French restaurant
13. Petite Solange: "coming-of-age story of a teen-age girl in a small French city against the backdrop of her parents’ divorce"
14. Ferrari (Michael Mann biopic)
15. Orlando, my political biography: "a docufictional and reflexive adaptation of Virginia Woolf’s historical fantasy “Orlando,” features more than twenty trans or gender-nonconforming actors in the title role"
16. Walk Up: Life in a Seoul multistory building; director Hong Sangsoo
17. Origin: "how the journalist Isabel Wilkerson wrote her nonfiction book “Caste”
18. Priscilla: biopic of Priscilla Presley
19. The Color Purple: musical based on the novel
20. Our Body: "Claire Simon’s documentary, set in the gynecology ward of a French hospital, explores a vast range of women’s-health and gender-related concerns"

I just realized Brody does not include Oppenheimer

>127 featherbear: It is humbling how few of those movies I have even heard of! Some of the ones I didn't know sound interesting; I hope they show up for streaming at some point. I'm thinking of All Dirt Roads Taste of Salt, Pinball, Origin and possibly Menus plaisirs and Our Body.

I want to begin adding my dvd's to LT. Could someone tell me the best way to do that? And how do you keep a movie from combining with a book? Anything special I should be aware of?

I've seen five of Brody's top 20 and walked out of a sixth in boredom. I'm with him on Killers of the Flower Moon, Asteroid City, Barbie, and A Thousand and One -- all fine movies. Showing Up didn't click for me, but that's generally the case with Kelly Reichardt's movies. And Passages is a dud.

>129 mysterymax: When I add a DVD to my LT collection, I search on one of the DVD/Blu-ray product numbers to make sure I retrieve & add the correct media type. That should ensure that it not be combined with a book (or the wrong media type, e.g. VHS) -- in other words, avoid searching on title when adding an item. If I am being misleading, please someone else in the group post a correction.

PS: For example, I have a Criterion Collection DVD of Yi Yi, and the product numbers on my LT record, in this case, are for EAN, UPC, or ASIN; one of them must have been somewhere printed on the container barcode.