Last Seen Movie - The Latest Movie You Have Seen; ratings

[Mister Tee]

Wow -- duelling responses posted simultaneously.

[Reza]

Bob and Carol and Ted and Alice (Paul Mazursky, 1969) 7/10

Really? I thought this thing was just silly in 1969 and downright embarrassing now. And I generally like Mazursky's films.

I was all set to be embarrassed but was quite pleasantly surprised. Who knows it could be because I am down with the flu and am generally feeling miserable.......and all that ''love'' talk perked me up a bit.

Bob Culp and Natalie Wood (at her loveliest) come off better than the two nominated actors....Elliott Gould and Dyan Cannon. And I loved the costumes worn by all four stars.



Edited By Big Magilla on 1241619555

[Mister Tee]

Bob and Carol and Ted and Alice (Paul Mazursky, 1969) 7/10

I just watched this again myself, for the first time since 1970. I was surprised at how well I remembered it -- not just the overall thrust, but many individual moments.

What stood out for me this time was how good Dyan Cannon was. Possibly because, uptight as she was, she came closest to embodying the audience's "are you people serious?" responses. Gould was also, as remembered, funny. Wood looked great, but didn't do anything special, nor did Culp.

The film showed Mazursky/Tucker's roots in revue comedy. The through-thread was pretty weak; we seemed to jump from one Nichols/May sketch to the next. But, given how funny much of it was -- particularly the Cannon/Gould bedroom scene -- that was a limitation with which I could live.

[Big Magilla]

Bob and Carol and Ted and Alice (Paul Mazursky, 1969) 7/10

Really? I thought this thing was just silly in 1969 and downright embarrassing now. And I generally like Mazursky's films.



Edited By Big Magilla on 1241619561

[Reza]

The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas (Mark Herman, 2008) 8/10

Bob and Carol and Ted and Alice (Paul Mazursky, 1969) 7/10

[Precious Doll]

Bashing (2005) Masahiro Kabayashi 7/10

Derby (1971) Robert Kaylor 7/10

The Signal (2007) David Bruckner, Jacob Gentary & Dan Bush 5/10

The Secret Life of Bees (2008) Gina Prince-Bythewood 4/10

Flashbacks of a Fool (2008) Baillie Walsh 2/10

Daniel Craig has blue eyes. The actor playing him at a younger age has brown eyes (and a very bad blond dye job). It must be said that that is the least of this films problems.

[Damien]

Ok, I see that. For me, I like to keep in mind that most of the film is told in flashback by someone who is confessing his heart and soul to the one man he has most respect for. He may be a faulty narrator, which could account for any awkwardness in his relations with Stanwyck's femme fatale.

From all reports, Fred MacMurray was not a particularly pleasant person in real life. Billy Wilder tapped into that aspect in both Double Inndemnity and The Apartment and the films are all the more effective for it. I think MacMurray is tremendous in Double Indemnity, and deserved a Best Actor nomination in lieu of Barry Fitzgerald.



Edited By Big Magilla on 1241619576

[rain Bard]

Ok, I see that. For me, I like to keep in mind that most of the film is told in flashback by someone who is confessing his heart and soul to the one man he has most respect for. He may be a faulty narrator, which could account for any awkwardness in his relations with Stanwyck's femme fatale.

[danfrank]

I agree that MacMurray is perfect for the everyman aspect of the role. I just wasn't convinced when he tried to sound like the tough guy, e.g., the way he keeps calling Stanwyck "baby." Maybe I wasn't supposed to be convinced, given that MacMurray's character is clearly in over his head with Stanwyck's Phyllis Dietrichson.

[rain Bard]

Double Indemnity (Billy Wilder, 1944) 8/10

This movie is entertaining as hell. Barbara Stanwyck and Edward G. Robinson are terrific. Fred MacMurray isn't bad, but I kept thinking that some other actor might have given this material the extra punch to make it even more of a classic than it already is (if that's possible). Any thoughts on who?

The casting of MacMurray as Walter Neff is one of the best things about the movie, imho. Alan Ladd and George Raft turned it down, thankfully. The film's success relies on Neff's everyman quality, so hiring a tough guy would have been a bad idea, and probably wouldn't have done as much to help sustain the noir cycle.



Edited By Big Magilla on 1241619590

[flipp525]

The film does suffer from a very weak wife role (wambly played by Kim Griest) as well as a rather dated 80's soundtrack.

The soundtrack probably is dated, but the use of that Iron Butterfly song in the climax is a stroke of genius on the part of Michael Mann.

Agreed. That was a great moment.



Edited By Big Magilla on 1241619606

[dws1982]

The film does suffer from a very weak wife role (wambly played by Kim Griest) as well as a rather dated 80's soundtrack.

The soundtrack probably is dated, but the use of that Iron Butterfly song in the climax is a stroke of genius on the part of Michael Mann.

And to this day, I prefer Brian Cox's Lecter (Lektor here) to Hopkins's. He's more quiet, and world-weary, and less boogey-man.

[Big Magilla]

Double Indemnity (Billy Wilder, 1944) 8/10

This movie is entertaining as hell. Barbara Stanwyck and Edward G. Robinson are terrific. Fred MacMurray isn't bad, but I kept thinking that some other actor might have given this material the extra punch to make it even more of a classic than it already is (if that's possible). Any thoughts on who?

Possibly Joel McCrea or Ray Milland, but I wouldn't begrudge MacMurray his breakout dramatic role after years of light comedy stardom. I think he was perfect in the part.

[Big Magilla]

Thanks for my morning laugh.

Well, sorry but ya know, there it is. I think it's funny that you had Hawkins down in your pre-nomination 2008 Shouldabeens for Best Actress (even though you had already admitted to not liking her performance[?]), and then quickly revised her out of them once the actual nominations came out and she had been surprisingly passed over. That was my morning laugh!

What a joyous morning!

I'm almost falling out of the chair now.

I think I included Sally Hawkins in my pre-noms before I saw Melissa Leo in Frozen River, but whatever. I'm sure she is a lovely person in real life. Her performance in Happy-Go-Lucky is a decent one. It's the character I didn't like.

She is apparently better liked in America where she won the majority of her awards than in Britain where wasn't even nominated for a BAFTA and where she lost the Independent Film Award to Vera Farmiga even though her co-star Alexis Zegerman won their supporting award.

I actually found this quite surprising because I considered Farmiga's role in The Boy in the Striped Pajamas a supporting one so either they really, really liked her or they really, really didn't like Hawkins all that much. I kind of think it was the latter.



Edited By Big Magilla on 1241619619

[flipp525]

Manhunter (Michael Mann, 1986) 6/10

Remade as Red Dragon in 2002, this first venture into the Hannibal Lecter series is actually rather compelling and well-made. Highly stylized cinematography with a very signature Michael Mann look, in this film the director manages to remember that the best thrillers have well-developed characters at their heart to make them successful.

William Peterson's character evolves as he gets mired deeper and deeper into the chase (in particular, I liked the "Profiler" way in which he went from third person to second person to first person when walking through a crime scene as the killer). Joan Allen is practically unrecognizable as the blind woman who is the killer's next victim. And Tom Noonan, an actor I only saw for the first time just last year in Synecdoche, New York, is genuinely unnerving as the serial killer. The film does suffer from a very weak wife role (wambly played by Kim Griest) as well as a rather dated 80's soundtrack.



Edited By flipp525 on 1237226266