Viewing Log #70: The possessive element made my chest thump [1/18/11 - 1/23/11]

by Ryland Walker Knight

—The world allows a lot

• 30 Rock "Mrs. Donaghy" [S5E10] Love the concepts, and kind of loved that Weinerslav scene, but the mirroring across the studio is getting stale (as are the caricatures). I wanted to include this here simply to be able to say: Chris Parnell is always the best actor/comedian on the show. He's allowed to be a caricature, plain and simple, and it works every single time.
  
  
• Two Lovers [James Gray, 2009] # Forgot how severe a downer this one is (somehow), how deep its truths cut. Yet Joaquin, as ever, made me laugh out loud a crazy number of times, as did some of the tossaway stuff his dad does. I'm still not in the "masterpiece" camp home to a lot of my friends, however, because of the cleverness of certain winks. Like, as much as its designed to excoriate the male psyche, it no doubt flatters it (or one kind of it), too. [I have no memory of what I wrote here.]
  
  
• Close-Up [Abbas Kiarostami, 1990] # Still fabulous. Sabzian is too perfect, in all his roles, to ever be a villain. The BR disc is phenomenal not for clarity but for color. Throughout the picture, the colors pool, adding weight. But don't count out the jokes—especially all that bluster by the reporter, a perfect clown for this procession.
  
  
• The Fighter [David O. Russell, 2010] I had a fine time watching it, even got some pangs of reflection when it comes to the self-reliance bits, but it's kind of a messy movie with a lot of competing, moving parts and a rather rote script. Worst thing is I don't think it was built to be something at odds with itself; instead, I think it's trying to serve too many agendas; or it's just kinda convoluted and cheesy in parts. The most curious thing, I find, is that fine line that separates the hamming Christian Bale does, which I dug, from the mugging Melissa Leo does, which I almost loathed. I think it's how Bale uses his eyes over against how Leo uses her mouth. People tell me they're both likely to win Oscars and that does not surprise me. (What Oscar result does anymore? ever?) I just wish Mila Kunis could/would beat Leo. [FWIW, the cinetrix kills it on the topic, as if that's a surprise.]

—Waves can surprise you

Convergence for your freeze outs (3/9/10)

by Ryland Walker Knight

A dope with dreams.

by Ryland Walker Knight

You may remember that I wrote a piece about James Gray for Cargo that got published around the end of May and early June. Well, now that the film is readily available for everybody to see, both here in Region-1 and there in Region-2, the essay now appears in the original English, with minor editorial changes that include some images, at The Auteurs' Notebook.

Forms of fate: James Gray's Two Lovers

by Ryland Walker Knight

—rings, sands
Just prior to my cross-country move, that fine gentleman critic Ekkehard Knörer wrote me, asking me to contribute a text to the first print issue of Cargo, a new German film magazine and website that Ekkehard has helped launch as one of its four editors. (David Hudson generously, and gracefully, covered its inception back at GreenCine.) Unfortunately, due to my lack of a screener and/or screening possibilities, I was unable to write about, let alone see, Soderbergh's Che in time for that premiere edition. Luckily, despite the rough and tumble—to say transitional—spring season, I was able to throw together some thoughts on James Gray's Two Lovers for the magazine's second printing. Though I can tell you my essay was titled "Rückansicht eines Melodrams", which means "Rear view of a Melodrama" according to Google's (I trust far too literal) translator*, as of today, the essay is unavailable online. Soon, though, I'm told, it will be presented in its original English. I'll be sure to let you all know here (and, I imagine, @ryknight) just as soon as that happens. Also, if you live in Germany and happen to read this blog, please do go buy a copy of the magazine once it hits the stands! I got a preview of the layout the other day and, as with No.1, it's gorgeous.

For a laugh, here is the little auto-bio I wrote to accompany my text:

Ryland Walker Knight is a writer born of California now living in Brooklyn. A graduate of the Rhetoric department at UC Berkeley, his blog, VINYL IS HEAVY, tracks his perpetual education (some might say conversation) with the image.

* The title given to my piece may, also, be a play on how I term the films Gray makes "obverse melodramas," but I will have to wait for Ekkehard, or any other bilingual German-English speaker, to tell me more. (Perhaps in the comments below?)