Random 10: Random Films for Comment - Week 3

i just would like to say that "ordet" is such a stone-cold masterpiece and its brilliant. its slow, but so worth it.

i go back and forth on Dreyer a lot. sometimes i just can't be bothered. other times i agree Ordet is a very great film.

that's all i've seen tho! how pathetic. I like this feature because it reminds me how many movies there are to see.

can't say I'm too interested in the Fellini (most late fellini i have seen is just boring to me) or the Mel Brooks (i just hate mel brooks) but everything else looks at least interesting.

Roma (1972) is actually an underated masterpiece in my opinion, too. It's a weird combo of fiction and documentary that I find to be riveting and it's wonderfully beautiful, garish, and grostesque. It has just about everything: a Papal fashion show, a motorcycle gang, a posh and low-rent whorehouse, an underground labyrinth, and spaghetti. Damn, I need to watch it again. Anyway, it's one of my most favorite Fellinis.

Shamefully, I have only seen this and Ordet out of the ten above. And yes, Todd, I agree that Ordet (1955) is a stone-cold masterpiece. It does exactly what you expect but totally defies all expectations. I don't think any other film comes as close to wearing the label "miraculous".

Ok, well, The Passion of Joan of Arc (1928) probably runs a close second.

"abbott and costello meet frankenstein" = only good horror comedy i can think of.

I still haven't seen Cuba but know of at least one intelligent person who thinks its the best movie of '79.

I've only seen The Twelve Chairs, but it's really not a normal Mel Brooks film - it really almost feels like you're watching a 1960's movie filmed on SovFilm that was just dubbed into English. It's fun, but not funny - I can't remember laughing once. But as a folktale-type movie, I think it does a decent job. And I've never forgotten the borsht scene, so I guess that means something. What, I don't know.

I've wanted to see Roma for a while since Gore Vidal has a cameo, I hear.

Can I ask what makes Ordet a masterpiece? I really liked The Passion of Joan of Arc, but Ordet was very disappointing. I didn't care about the putative theme of the film at all, and I don't think that filmed theater is really the pinnacle of what the medium has to offer. What am I missing about this one?

Shivers was another letdown for me at the time that I watched it, but it's been so long that my memories of it are very hazy. Definitely not as good as later Cronenberg, though.

I'm perplexed as to why anyone would view Ordet as filmed theater. Just the scene where Johannes enters and lights candles early in the film is so steeped in camera movement and off-screen presence.

Hmm, maybe I'm relying too much on other people's reviews of the movie now, but wasn't most of the movie deliberately staged and shot in a way that's reminiscent of theatrical performance? It certainly felt like it was. The scene with the candles felt like a standard and somewhat corny moment in a play-- I envisioned it happening on a stage when I saw it, the camera movement replicating the wandering eye of an audience member.

like water for chocolate, when i saw it, i thought was really good. satisfyi9ng kind of good. the sort of movie that you leave with a good feeling and then you go out for really really good ice cream.

but then with alllll the hype the idea of it started to annoy me. and there's been so many food/sensuality-themed films that it just seems like an overused sort of basis for a movie anymore.l