My favorite quotable passage from Wilson’s review:
“Bernard Shaw attempted something of this sort in Saint Joan, explaining in the preface that he was writing tragedy, not melodrama, and defining the difference elagantly: ‘Melodrama deals with the conflict of good and evil, tragedy with the conflict of good and good.’ Not quite; it would be better to define tragedy as the conflict of ambiguity and ambiguity.”
There was a made-for-TV version in the 1980s that didn’t try to make Becky sympathetic, and left the ending with Jos intact. A wonderful performance by an actress named Eve Matheson, who I’ve never seen in a major role elsewhere. I’ve been waiting for years for that to come out on DVD.
Is this thread a ploy to lure Argent Towers/Tours d’Argents back? Are you really him? The two of you have never been seen together here…
The first technicolor feature film, Becky Sharp, was pretty, well, *sharp *in its depiction of Becky. Miriam Hopkins had the perfect combination of squeaky cuteness and grasping duplicity (she was Oscar nommed). And the ending is pretty much intact.
PSXer, the problem is not that people can’t sit still for long movies anymore. I remember the comments when the film came out, and they are exactly the same as the ones people now make. There have always been people who loved it and people who hated it (and various positions in between those two), and I suspect that there always will be people with both reactions to the film. I consider it hopeless to even attempt to argue about it. I like it. It’s not my favorite film, but it’s in my top 100 favorites (of the 3,000 or so films I’ve seen in my life).
That’s as may be (or not) but there’s no question that a studio today would never allow, for example, The Exorcist to be made as it was originally: the first third of the movie character setup; nothing really “happens” till around the 45 minute mark. I don’t care how much of a masterpiece that movie is considered nowadays, there isn’t a single suit in all of Hollywood that would have the courage to do that nowadays.
So yeah, these things do in fact change.
This is one of my two favorite Kubrick films along with 2001, which I guess means I have a high tolerance for sitting on my bum for three hours while images flash in front of me, but even if it wasn’t, it would still hold a special place for me. I went to see it in Paris with the woman who eventually lived with me for ten years, and she apparently was so overcome by its beauty that she practically ripped my clothes off in the metro going home. That was one memorable weekend.
Length isn’t really the issue but, rather, pacing. Modern movies like LOTR or Avatar may be super-long by historical standards but the pacing and editing of scenes are dramatically faster. Character development is sketched in with shortcuts like catchphrases, exposition is spiced up with “wow” visuals, and jump cuts are used to imply speed even for the most mundane scenes, etc. All these techniques appeal to today’s information overloaded, hyper-linked world and sometimes they’re used to very good effect (Michael Bay movies excepted).
However, I lament the loss of older methods that had their own advantages. I love movies that give me a chance to absorb a scene and to soak up the atmosphere or to appreciate complex characterizations. Kubrick’s formalistic approach reflects his roots as a photographer and his scenic compositions often provide a richer subtext for his movies than just pretty pictures. This is as true of “Barry Lyndon” as any other of his movies.
Not to mention that long, slow takes are unrivaled for building a mood. Flash cuts are good for surprise or shock value, but you have to give an audience time to get uncomfortable, to think and worry about things in order to build suspense. The scene between Barry and his future wife at the gaming table is a masterpiece of sexual tension precisely since it’s so long and drawn out.
At least a few modern directors, like Tarantino, get this. “Inglourious Basterds” contained some of the most suspenseful movie scenes I’ve ever experienced and they consisted of nothing but people sitting around a table and talking. Sadly, today, this is considered audacious.
I like long boring films that are beautifully filmed. So I like Barry Lyndon and … wait for it … Heaven’s Gate. Do not take friends to these movies unless you want to lose them as friends.
Heaven’s Gate is a western range war movie where the townsfolks and the cattle barons go at it and most of them die at the end in a gruesome bloody battle. It has strong socialist themes, real socialism, not the modern everything to the left of Glenn Beck is socialist. It is filmed outdoors and it is visually stunning. Oh, and there is one scene where a roller skater is at an indoor wooden rink/tent skating in circles playing a violin that is one of the best scenes put on film anywhere. I seem to remember it had a sepia tone look as the camera skated around the floor with him. Absolutely stunning.
For that matter, even the original Texas Chainsaw Massacre is too slow-paced for modern standards. The first half of the film is just creepy buildup with no bloodshed. Today, slice-‘n’-dice directors seem to feel obligated to space the killings as regularly as porn directors space cumshots.
I actually snorted when I read this. I own more movies than that.
I don’t claim to have seen more films than anyone else here. It’s obvious to me that quite a few people here have seen more. I only mentioned the number because someone might ask, “Top 100? Out of how many?”.
Movies like the Peter Jackson’s The Lord of the Rings films and Avatar are boring to me. Barry Lyndon is much more interesting to me. At the time Barry Lyndon came out, many people complained that it was long and boring. They did not mean that it didn’t have enough fast cutting. They meant that it slowly developed and it had many scenes without dialog. People complained back then about films that they thought were boring and they complain now about films they think are boring. What’s changed is the definition of boring.
I’m a huge Kubrick fan. I used to like this film, but for me it wasn’t anywhere near his other films. For some reason, as I get older, this film just keeps getting better and better. It’s now one of my favorite films.
The whole movie is filled with incredible tension and swallowed emotion, incessant conflict, moral complexity, and capped off with the greatest duel I’ve ever seen, which is perhaps my favorite scene in all of cinema.
Ebert’s review is also very insightful. While I don’t agree it is emotionless, it certainly is detached, with a narrator who tells you what will happen well in advance, leaving you to just watch it all unfold.
http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20090909/REVIEWS08/909099993/1023
Avatar was about two and a half hours of build-up. And there’s plenty of modern slow movies that essentially exist for cinematography eaters:
Sounds great but I’d rather call this drama, not tragedy. The sine qua non of drama is conflict, in a tragedy it’s failure.
El_Kabong, excellent result. I take it, you became an expert in finding similar movies afterwards.
I’ve tried to watch it twice but just too boring. Kubrick’s done better. Most notably with casting R Lee Ermey in “Full Metal Jacket”.
Oh, I LOVED it. I saw it in the movie theater and wasn’t bored for a minute. So many images were burned into my impressionable mind that I really believe I was “imprinted” by them. Maybe that’s why I adore historical dramas, why Last of the Mohicans is one of my favorite movies ever… Here, here, look at this:http://youtube.com/watch?v=qfvCjLgbpy0&feature=related … hey, where ya going?
I love Barry Lyndon,
But it always bugs me how a director as talented and full of attention to detail used s many Mausers and trap-door Springfields in the battle scenes. C’mon Stan! Get the props in gear already!