I’ve been avoiding it because I can’t get emotionally worked up over a cartoon.
I love that movie. Fucking love it!
I agree that the characters were pretty loathsome but it was an incredible movie .
I heard that the big names in the film appeared for peanuts because they thought that it was such a gob smacking piece of writing.
Ben-Hur (1959). The acting was so stilted, especially Charlton Heston’s. The same with El Cid.
When Roger Ebert started reprinting his Sun-Times film reviews in Book form in the 1980s, he included the 1982 edition of the decennial Sight and Sound Critics Poll of the ten best films of all time. I made it a point try and see them.
- Citizen Kane - I like it. Seen it several times. Not the best film ever, but a good 'un.
2. La Regle du Jou (Rules of the Game, by Jean Renoir) Tried it twice, couldn’t get into it. It happened, then it was over. Can’t imagine why this has been a perennial favorite for half a century.
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Seven Samurai - One of the best films ever.
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Singin’ in the Rain - I very reluctantly wind up with a silly grin by the end of this one every time. Great.
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8 1/2 - Not for all tastes, but I like it.
6. Battleship Potemkin- The Odessa Steps sequence in the middle is indeed visually memorable, but the other four sections are a snooze. Of course, the only way I could see it at the time was a VHS tape that was released by a company doing the silent-film equivalent of the horrid pastel colorization of B&W classics that was its contemporary: They adjusted the frame rate to make people’s bodily motions go at a realistic speed, which makes some shots last for-freakin’-ever and throws off the pacing.
7. L’Avventura - The reason people hate 1960s foreign art films. One of the worst pieces of crap I’ve ever seen.
7. The Magnificent Ambersons - It’s just OK. Technically inept. There’s a great PBS documentary about how technically screwed up it is. There’s so much overdubbing to cover up mistakes that you feel removed from the film. Good book though, if you can lay your hands on it.
7. Vertigo - I do not get the love for this thing, other than that Kim Novak is gorgeous. There are at least 6 Hitchcock films I’d rather see again.
**
10. The General - I can think of 6 other Keaton films I’d rather see again, too.**
Listed as #100 on the Modern Library’s list of the top 100 novels of the 20th century. (*Ulysses * was #1.)
One day, I had a few hours to kill and The English Patient was on HBO, so I thought “Well, I heard it was a snorefest, but hey, maybe it’s really good.” So I got settled and turned it on, prepared to be moved (or something).
Literally 7 minutes after the film started, I thought “Hmm. How long have I been sitting here? At least a 30 minutes…” I was shocked to discover it was only 7.
But I’m strong. I’ve sat through bad movies. I can persevere.
5 more minutes crawl by. I refuse to give up 12 minutes into a film. I need to give it a fair shot.
By the time 30 minutes passes, I finally understand what it means to say that time is relative. I give up, a lot older, and a little wiser.
Just saw Scent of a Woman this week. I think I honestly got more out of the spoofs of it on the animated show, “The Critic.” I normally love Pacino, but I found his character here so irritating. Nothing but “Hoohahs,” an overly drawn out “attempted” suicide, and the scariest Ferrari ride ever. It just dragged…all the scenes that could’ve been cool just bombed, for me. Not such a surprise that the same director made one of the worst movies of this decade.
*Taxi Driver. *I sat through it, thinking there must be a reason why it’s an “important” film. Then asked myself “WTF?”
*Dances with Wolves. *I started watching this several times, and each time I literally fell asleep. It should be marketed as a cure for insomnia.