Viewing Log #59: Mine, all mine [11/8/10 - 11/14/10]

by Ryland Walker Knight

• The Taking of Pelham 123 [Tony Scott, 2009] As prep for Unstoppable because I didn't make it to the theatre this weekend and I did want to watch this one first since they're both about trains. As Danny and Andrew and I laughed on 6th Avenue that one time, its final shot is so fucking cheesy cheese balls that it almost works. And the movie's goofy enough along its nowhere way to love like a pet, like a fishtank maybe.
  
• —A bullet for the entire week. The first four episodes of the fourth season of The Sopranos [Fall 2002]. The early star of this season is Janice and her insanity, which is good for a "holy shit" as often as a laugh, as when she's encouraged to talk to Ralph about breaking up with the compassion she's famous for—only to, instead, throw him down the stairs. That this event also involves the other stalwart of this season, Joe Pantoliano's Ralph, speaks to the writers' obvious excitement at throwing these two hairballs of crazy at each other, if only for a few hours of screen time. And it's a great analog to Ralph's relationship with Tony, as evidenced in Ralph's kink to be pegged and degraded in bed. Because this show, fearless as it is, goes there.
  
  
• Whip It [Drew Barrymore, 2009] Kinda clumsy and clichéd, but winning with its jokes and its tight script and its performances, this thing's a real rawr'r for all the girls out there. And for saps like me, I suppose, who aren't afraid of the word "feminist" as much as they might've been, say, a couple years ago. Also, because, duh, this kind of strength is sexy as much as simply charming.
  
• Van Gogh [Maurice Pialat, 1991] Almost feels like a Renoir with all the hanging out at parties and the theatrical staging of certain events, but it's certainly a Pialat in its offhanded, everyday dealings with sex and desire. That is, nothing's sensational or trumpeted. Or, if things are, it's the violence people do unto one another, not the acts of love, which are always understated and (here at least) often edited around. Nudity isn't racy, it's a fact, for Pialat. Just as are flings and the fluid (some might say fickle) changes a person can seem to undergo in the course of an afternoon, or 67 days, though it's obvious to the aware viewer than the person hasn't changed; it's how s/he's choosing to interact with others, with the surrounding world. Which is to say that once again here's a film about perception as registered in actions, without psychology, or without access to the minds inside the many clam-like characters.
  
  
• Vivre sa via [JLG, 1962] # Another ringing BluRay recommendation. Amazing what JLG's able to convey with simple title cards, how two words will color a face five minutes later; a face, as is often the case, turned from the action that the camera's turned from, doubling the negation and the horror. The film also wins, of course, because of Anna Karina—but you knew that already. The point is to watch this and pay attention to the shape of it, not of her, as JLG's films are often blocky, as reflected in the 4:3 frame, but this one takes it further to break up the blocks themselves; it's a film of segregation, really, in the most basic way—separations determine everything. It's bleak. But it looks so good! (Sometimes I think it's the best one of this, the much vaunted, early period, because it's such a "pure" document. All the "tricks" serve some concrete answer to the question. After all, A.Baz's Q is the only one we all answer differently, and never the same way twice.)
  
• The Red Shoes [Powell & Pressburger, 1948] # Consider this my endorsement for the BluRay Criterion put out of the new Film Foundation restoration. Everything's sharp, sure, but there's grain in there. And the colors feel real as much as caked-on and painted-loud surreal. Not to mention the fact that the movie is superb, of course, and speaks to a number of things on my ideas-worth-thinking-about check list. This time all I could focus on, whether due to a flu or to this presentation, was the well-renowned mise-en-scene of the film. A favorite moment is somebody saying something about Lermontov leaving on the 8:15 train to Paris, to which Vicky responds by looking up at the top left corner of the frame, which aptly dissolves to a clock on the platform, hands at 8:05, with her eyes directly on it. It's a simply thing, really, and obvious, but it's also an effective visual touch that's become rather rare in the making of movies these days. It's also the kind of thing people like to laugh at, or point at, in current cinemas like, say, a Wes Anderson picture, as some kind of arch touch when it's simply good visual storytelling. Sure, there's variances in tone between my two examples but I get the same thrill from, say, Kumar saying, "There he goes," followed by a shot of Owen Wilson hailing a cab, as I do this clock moment. Though, of course, in a world of "cut-away" humor (even good versions of it like on this week's 30 Rock) this pointing within a story can seem short-hand for clever instead of actually being clever. At any rate, this picture is not just clever, it's gorgeous. And worth sharing.
  
  
• 30 Rock "Brooklyn Without Limits" [S5E7, 2010] We all know, as somebody on This Recording said, that it's Tina Fey's rack, not her butt, that turns LL's nerd chic into some kind of sexy (and makes TF's classier IRL attire that much more attractive) with, among other things, all those deep-V's. We also know that this season is turning out great, with "veiled" jabs all over the place: at the show itself, its character construction say, and at this modern world, as some say, with a bunch of dumb gross out jokes I can't get enough of since they're neither dumb nor all that gross.
  
  
• Open Five [Kentucker Audley, 2010] More here.
  
  
• That Paul Millsap explosion in that Jazz-Heat game sure was something. It's almost like Carlos Boozer's an afterthought these daze. Also, the Heat-as-villains can't quite work when they play like chumps coasting on cred they haven't earned yet together.

Viewing Log #55: September highlights

by Ryland Walker Knight

• demonlover [Olivier Assayas, 2002] Look at this twitpic, and then read Glenn's thing maybe. Here, again, I risk the wrath of GK, and Kent Jones: it's a hoot, and largely fascinating, but also the owner of a rather empty punchline.
  
• The Social Network [David Fincher, 2010] A problematic, thoroughly entertaining film I hope I never have to talk to anybody about ever again.
  
• The Thin Red Line [Terrence Malick, 1998] # Here's some gushing and here's some mush-mouth. It's important to me.
  
• The Last Picture Show [Peter Bogdonavich, 1971] As formal as it gets and so, so apt to anybody with an ear for confusion. You know, everybody.
  
• A Brighter Summer Day [Edward Yang, 1991] Worth every minute. Loved how much of it's specifically about light, and shining lights (on things) and not seeing because of the lack of light, and how all the big acts of violence happen at night, in low light. If I see it again (and hopefully in a theatre again), I'll take real notes and maybe write a real poem about it.
  
• Pretty much every single episode of Tim & Eric Awesome Show Great Job [T+E, 2007-2010] # Cuz I had to. And cuz I love it. Cuz they're the best. (Sure, it gets/got tiresome; but who gives a turd ya dingus?)
  
• The Tim & Eric Awesome Show Great Job Crimbus Special and Tour Promo [T+E, 2010] The best thing in the world. Everything.
  
• Enter The Void [Gaspar Noé, 2009] I tried to be positive at this joint and largely failed.
  
• The first half of Season Three of The Sopranos [David Chase?, 2001] #, which is absolutely brutal and absolutely fantastic and rather often absolutely hilarious.
  
• Danny Perez's visuals at the Panda Bear show; especially the wave and its square spots at the end.
  
• Oedipus Wrecks [Woody Allen, 1989] A lot of fun, in part because it's "on the nose."
  
• Life Lessons [Martin Scorsese, 1989] Rituals, process, it's all a lie to try to cover your patterns.
  
• Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter? [Frank Tashlin, 1957] At the Castro, with Brian. The opening is my favorite part.

Viewing Log #53: Ring around the rosey [7/28/10 - 8/8/10]

by Ryland Walker Knight

• Step Brothers [Adam McKay, 2008] Both Will Ferrell and John C Reilly are perfect at the adolescent petulance and a lot of the slapstick made me laugh a lot, too. Then there was the stray absurdity like the wood nymph and centaur fantasy, or the lumberjack fantasy, and I love it when this team will indulge those impulses.
  
• Date Night [Shawn Levy, 2010] It's fascinating how much I adore Tina Fey. Oh, wait, it's not.
  
  
• The Sopranos "D-Girl" [Allen Coulter, 2000] One of the lesser directorial efforts in the series run (what's with all those black outs?) but any episode basically centering on Chris is one worth watching.
  
• Gamer [Nevaldine/Taylor, 2009] Woke up early on a Saturday, much like the previous one (see below), and watched another Ignatiy-sanctioned id-blast of dummy horror show. I liked this one even more. Now, I.V.'s review is kind of like a mission statement for that dude (it would appear), as it starts with "Glory to those with the intelligence to have bad taste." My first thought's a shrug—I guess so—but that's all you need for this movie. I'd probably give it four out of five stars but only because it's an impressive feat of regurgitation and because it's short. Everything's got its source but, much as Gerrard Butler vomits up alcohol to start a car to escape the game, these N/T dudes are seemingly throwing up as many ideas as possible just to whip up your eyes like egg whites. Which is to say that everything's intentional but nothing's weighted beyond the play of light, rendering the entire 95 minutes child's play. What remains refreshing is that the film's not out to prove anything. We know what's right and wrong and apparently it's right to kill your way free of puppet strings, no matter the collateral damage, as long as you've got an absurdly attractive wife and daughter ready for your nuclear restoration. Prurience often masks pretty vanilla aims at bottom. Or so it goes in Ho'wood.
  
  
• Fort Apache [John Ford, 1948] Around the time John Wayne interrupts Shirley Temple and John Agar on the back steps, I heard myself snoring with half a beer nearly emptying itself on my lap and a plate of pizza sitting half eaten nearly toppling itself off the armrest. This was a reflection of my body, not my brain. I did have time, though, to get supremely affected simply by Fonda's face. Haven't identified why, yet, but his face makes me run through a gamut of feelings.
  
  
• Cemetery Junction [Stephen Merchant and Ricky Gervais, 2010] There's a reason it's going straight to DVD here. Not only is it neck-thick in British culture, it's just about as earnest as can be imagined with these dudes. This isn't to say I didn't laugh at all but it's pretty damned straight forward and features the worst tendencies of all the Merchant-Gervais comedies full bore: lots of mean-spirited jokes for the longest set up of the most sentimental pay offs you'll see. In a way, it's cute how they want to inspire (or some such) but in another way it's just rote.
  
• Armored [Nimrod Antal, 2009] About that script: terrible dialog but perfect B-movie structure with one body after another raising the stakes and the fever. About that director: he makes spaces legible, yes, but he's victim to the editing board's splay of coverage like plenty of others. What really amazed me, and maybe this was because I watched it on a computer, was that the sound stayed down; that the film felt quiet despite the violence erupting. Also, as Matt Dillon gets older, he and his brother look more alike (noses notwithstanding). Worth a watch on a Wednesday.
  
  
• Orlando [Sally Potter, 1992] Here's a movie. I didn't know it would be funny, like laugh-out-loud funny, and I didn't know it'd be so fleet. Every scene's got a joke or two and Orlando himself, becoming herself, is a joke already in a film: you cannot cast a man who will become a woman, literally/physically, so you've got to go androgynous enough that the switch, with whatever "true" sex apparent, will make sense. And of course it makes more sense to move away from drag in a story of actualization (though, of course, failures abound). I doubt I'll write any more any time soon (unless commissioned) about the picture, but I started reading the book and I already think it'd be a great object lesson for just about any class I could dream to teach (though a course on adaptation is the first destination I leap to) at a collegiate level. Which is to say, I hope to not simply see it with some other people who are important to me but to talk about it, too. If Haz and I ever live near each other again, we'll most definitely resurrect the podcast.
  
  
• The A-Team [Joe Carnahan, 2010] Because of this one, which I sent to my dad, which he basically agreed with to the point of denigrating Inception in favor of this slideshow's stupidity (or "stupid fun"). That is, I enjoyed myself better than I expected to, and Ignatiy's assessment of Bradley Cooper ("that he can make a face like a dog that's very happy to see you") makes it so I'll only ever be charmed by that idiot grin; he has the face of a movie star, sure, but he deploys the persona of every asshole I've met who reads men's magazines for "how to"s as much as for the glossy porn of purchase-able items. Which is to say that this is the flip side of Inception's appeal to the boys with money, the club-shirt side vs the I-wear-a-vest side, and it's no surprise that (though both are "objectionable") the club's more fun.
  
  
• Cop Out [Kevin Smith, 2010] Way too long, of course, and way not funny enough as the time ticks by, of course, but it's saved from complete boredom towards the end because Tracy Morgan does his Tracy Morgan thing and gets wacky at any moment he's allowed, which, it would appear, was an always-encouraged "always" on this set. Bruce Willis does Bruce Willis, too, but that's stale-ish and I didn't dig all the truly potty-based jokes. Final note: I'd be suspicious of the neighbor, too, if my wife looked like Rashida Jones and I looked like Tracy Morgan and I chose a profession that kept me from home more hours than I spent there. As if you doubted it: no future as an "arm of the law" here.

Last Lost: "The End"

by Ryland Walker Knight

Granted, a six-season series premised on mystery could never deliver a satisfying "solution" to its "riddles." Hell, a lot of Chandler stories make you feel hollow. But the difference there, I suppose, isn't the investment versus reward thing but the kind of nuance and general philosophical arguments made by such endings, and such style. The MacGuffin as a way to get around mystery's meaning and all that. Which is why a lot of the riffing on Lost seemed excusable: in the interest of entertainment and tickling your brain, and dollars in the bank. However, artistically, you can't ask for dumber. Tug-o-war is, as most people will learn at one point, only fun for one group of people in the end.

The only excusable rationale behind the ending of Lost puts that whole "sideways" story—or "primed" as I've called it through this run—inside Jack's skull as a real flash before his eyes, before they close for good. However, everything about that story line aimed to show these characters as the characters they were on the island. This presumes a few stupid things we're supposed to simply believe in because the second-to-last scene was set in a church. For example, given the waves of relief after those flashes, it would appear that these characters are all just waiting to die while Jack hugs his dad; by extension, everything does revolve around Jack in the way he believed. That's not exactly bad writing, but here it's unchecked hubris. In fact, it's celebrated as finding some faith. And, then, all the other people are only there because the only thing that mattered in their lives was the island or what happened on the island. That is, instead of making the final escape matter the most—Kate and Sawyer and Claire can shack up in an unholy trio of bad vibes and worse life choices!—and where the fuck does Richard go from here?!—we're supposed to find Jack's "full circle" endgame poignant. Put otherwise, it's cynical and narrow-minded and not about living life.

I don't care about the implausibilities of everything. In fact, I dig the fantastic the most. The imagination is what drove the show on, and kept its fans hooked; the tease of the possible. We've all written our own branching fan fiction already with our guesses and our gchats and our weekly recaps. Lost's lasting legacy won't be that it united a record amount of viewers but that it knew how to play the television medium perfectly. It maximized sentimentality, action and wallets with a few decent jokes and a ton of bad ones. And I'd be fine with it as a goof if it didn't take itself so seriously. All this talk about "letting go" in the final season is clearly aimed at the audience, that they'll/we'll be okay without these characters, but basically it's the bullshit way out of the same predicament any great show faces. This is what makes The Sopranos so brilliant, still, because I can remember that confusion and then thrill when the screen went black and we thought Cuyler's cable had gone out but in a minute realized we'd just gotten duped into expecting a resolution we'd never feel satisfied with. I don't care if Tony was killed or not, which is why giving these characters tidy death fantasies on Lost is such an affront. Some of the best moments of Lost were the unexpected deaths. That death was never fair, even when it was expected.

Call me morbid, but I'm terrified of dying. But I think about it a lot. I heard Stanley Cavell say once that any philosopher takes up philosophy because his or her life has been shattered in some way and s/he wants to reckon how, not why. If you take a look at Lost as you should any text that matters (it clearly struck a chord with plenty, evaluations of quality aside), you'll see a lot of avenues for thoughtful engagement. But, as the finale proved, all roads converge again (likely in a pile-up). The branches I got so jazzed about at the start of this season were more like tributaries. And we know that water runs down hill, toward the ocean. Unless, of course, you're on a crazy island full of magnets and mystic shit and clackety smoke. There, the water runs to a source, a light source, a source of light—and that light's absolving in the right circumstances. That's what I'll take away: that they made it about light, and opening your eyes. I'm not exactly satisfied, but I'm also done. I'll take my flight from this fancy free dream machine. I'm sure I'll talk about it a bit more here and there but, really, I don't need to think about Lost again. Hell, I'd rather watch a Sopranos, or a Seinfeld, and laugh my butts off. Those were shows that knew how to quit and keep a carrot dangling. The secret, I'm certain, is in the comedy. Picking up pieces or sweeping junk away, you gotta love this life. Or at least laugh at it.

Viewing Log #40: On earth as it is [4/5/10 - 4/11/10]

by Ryland Walker Knight

—How it falls, plays, waves

• Alamar [Pedro González-Rubio, 2009] This one's playing SFIFF53, and I watched it on a screener with headphones. That seemed okay to me. It's a quiet, small thing. But it's also impressive photography of a world I'll likely never know but through this magic medium. It further impresses me that González-Rubio is his own cinematographer and that he barely gets in the way of these three generations and their time with water, and an egret. More in my festival preview, I promise, which should probably hit the webs this week.
  
• Read My Lips [Jacques Audiard, 2001] Supremely entertaining and ingratiating quasi-thriller. I think it's more interesting than Beat That My Heart Skipped, too, though its aural effects are only employed when it suits the filmmaker, not the story; or, though it's clearly Devos' movie (and what a joy that is!), the forced perspective registered by the soundtrack is inconsistent. Which is to say that Audiard has a lot of ideas, no doubt, but he's not exactly rigorous and he's not exactly free-wheeling. Will be interesting to see how this flux plays in Un Prophète, which I expect to like, as I've liked the other two I've seen. In all honesty, it'd be great to make something this accomplished, sturdy and engrossing. There's even a few jokes.
  
  
• Dodsworth [William Wyler, 1936] Nice to see something with a happy ending after the bittersweet, brush-the-edge finale of the McCarey. Walter Huston is a little loud, but still nuanced, and Mary Astor's calm makes me somersault with hope that, yes, life is long and I'll be presented plenty of opportunities to find a real help meet some day down the line. Also, Wyler's got some chops, duh, and a penchant for playing with focus in key moments. Brian already tweeted about the pivotal phone, but I'd also like to point to the mirrors, specifically the one in Vienna that keeps fantasies "outside" or "off" the real world.
  
• Make Way For Tomorrow [Leo McCarey, 1937] Lived up to the hype, and the precedent set by the other McCarey films I love. But I don't have anything to add to what Danny wrote here, or what Tag Gallagher wrote for the new Criterion disc, which I'd urge anybody to enjoy with or without a lover. Also, I'd urge you watch The Awful Truth directly afterwards. And then I'd urge you to keep your job.
  
  
• Greenberg [Noah Baumbach, 2010] As Dan Sallitt said to me last week, I don't get why Baumbach has to make everybody so nasty. But I laughed a lot, and loudly, in that almost-empty theatre. Hiring Harris Savides was a wise choice, as was casting Greta Gerwig, whose seemingly natural élan turns preternatural next to Ben Stiller. I don't know how she sold that attraction so well, but it's got a lot more to do with lust and loneliness than with true chemistry. And the movie seems to get that, too. But I don't think Ben Stiller can play that as well as Gerwig can, and everything she does masks that in the ways we all mask those impulses. A curious picture that's almost something; if it weren't hilarious, it'd be nothing.
  
• Micmacs [Jean-Pierre Jeunet, 2009] As far as festival openers go, this is fine. Will probably make everybody exiting the Castro on the 22nd smile a lot, and desire company. That is, its capricious (arch?) proclivity for goofy gears at work is amiable enough and the filmmaking is Jeunet's least expository, to say swiftest, if forever ostentatious/ornate. Great final shot, though.
  
  
• The Sopranos "Made In America" [S6E21, David Chase, 2007] # Nearly every single line makes me laugh, but it's dry and dire, too; nothing's as outlandish as it could be. Some of that's the performances, too, but a lot is the writing and the directing. It's the best kind of surrealism that matches "the world" to dreams' fluid, deft, associational tilt on actions—or that possibility in formal arrangements—be they sounds, like the ring of a door opening, or accidents, like a car in neutral rolling over a dead head, or anything else, like the aphasia one faces in a sea of others or like the absurdity of a cat staring at a dead man's cheesy portrait.
  
  
• Plastic Bag [Ramin Bahrani, 2009] Finally got around to watching this because a good friend said he liked it. Doesn't "side firmly with things" in the end, as Ignatiy wrote here, and it's only the quality of Herzog's voice (and what kind of intentionality that brings) that gives the little ditty anything. It's pretty, I guess, but it's still about human desires, not a bag's. (Similar problems as with that Pixar paean to bathos and trash.)

—I should look for leaves?

Viewing Log #32: Dancin on our tongues [2/1/10 - 2/7/10]

by Ryland Walker Knight

• Fantastic Mr. Fox [Wes Anderson, 2009] # For a refresher/clarifier before the super sunday daze of dips and bottled beers. Again, as ever: every single shot brims with pretty, with information, with affect. If only the bad guys weren't so simple...
  
  
• The Sopranos "Johnny Cakes" [Tim Van Patten, 2006] # Weird to see 2006 so clearly as they show it here: greedy, duplicitous, blind and hypocritical. Or that's the image I like to rear-project. But there's also Vito's final admission, his true desires coming to the fore, and that dawning's nice to see.
  
• The Sopranos "Luxury Lounge" [Danny Leiner, 2006] # SO funny, but good grief some ugly things, like Artie's bullshit, are just so ugly. In any case, Kingsley and Bacall are fucking great, of course, but the fish-out-of-water jokes with Carmine and Chris are the best. Also, robbing Bacall? Priceless. Oh, and, for what it's worth, that rabbit that Artie cooks looks amazing. Even at 10pm.
  
• Playtime [Jacques Tati, 1967] # Only a few scenes on Blu Ray at my dad's. The palate on this edition is so subtle! All the pale folders and cubicle walls don't zing; they're almost like a clouded neon, like "maybe look at me." Also, duh, this is probably what I'm going to start answering when people ask me what my favorite movie is. I know, I know, Malick means a lot to me, but, hell, this is what I'm talking about.
  
  
• The Philadelphia Story [George Cukor, 1940] # Pure pleasure from start to finish. Cary's a little heavier here, somehow, than in His Girl Friday (same year) and, lemme tell ya, it works. Though that could be attributable to Jimmy Stringbean Stewart and lil Kate standing next to him. More here.
  
  
• Lost "LA X" (Parts 1+2) [Jack Bender + Paul A. Edwards, 2010] Dug it, a lot. More here.
  
  
• Casa De Lava [Pedro Costa, 1994] # Finished it up a day later. Sometimes I miss this style from him, because he's so good at it, but as Edwin has said, I appreciate Costa's vision of cinema almost as much as some of his films. And it's funny to see this earlier vision, so realized already, so jettisoned after Ossos. More coming.

Viewing Log #30: Color cannot clean a canting [1/18/10 - 1/24/10]

by Ryland Walker Knight

—Sat behind Godard.

• Casino [Martin Scorsese, 1995] # Like for the first time. I'm blown away. This is the ur-Scorsese picture. Everything's dialed up delirium, all the colors and lights and camera movements. For such a sad and scary movie, it's damned fucking giddy. I'm publishing this as I'm watching it, so my giddiness is sure to wane as these fools keep fucking up their silver lined lot.
  
• Californication [Most of the third season] It was way too easy to do errands and little writing projects and just plow through this in one day. Rain played a part, but, also the sex.
  
  
• Playtime [Jacques Tati, 1967] # Yes, the best. Really: the best.
  
  
• The Seventh Victim [Mark Robson, 1943] # I tweeted a hash tag (#bestmovieever?) that gets at how powerful this thing is for me, especially at this stage in the game, with its weight and frisson of social anxieties. More Monday.
  
• Cat People [Jacques Tourneur, 1942] # Simon Simone's nose, let me tell you, can do things to a boy. Also, Tourneur's pace is all wonky: a real jam of angles keeps this from slipping down easy. More Monday.
  
  
• A Letter to Uncle Bonmee [Apichatpong Weerasethakul, 2009] Watched on The Auteurs for free (click here) and then wrote this little nugget about it.
  
• "Parisian Goldfish" by Flying Lotus [Eric Wareheim, 2009] Watched at the behest of Danny while talking Coachella. It's really something. Watch it here. It's very NSFW. It's weird: how much is celebratory? How much is a joke? Can it be both? I'm continually flabbergasted by the audacity of T+E.
  
  
• Band of Brothers, "Currahee" Episode 1 [Phil Alden Robinson, 2001] Halfway decent, but a lot of it is what I hate about war movies and World War II movies in particular. I appreciate that generation, of course, since it gave us its youth in ways I can't imagine, but I'm pretty sick of it getting called "the greatest" all the time. Weird to see so many British actors playing Americans, including Simon Pegg of all people.
  
• The Sopranos "Live Free or Die" (S6,E6) [Tim Van Patten, 2006] # The world opens for one man, for a bit, in the form of a vase and a bed & breakfast. Too bad you know this natural can't escape that hateful haunting in his history. There's more Paulie's than Tony's in this world. Even with Bacala's dunderheaded "Well we can't have him in our social club no more; that I do know."
  
• The Sopranos "Mr. & Mrs. John Sacramoni Request..." (S6,E5) [Steve Buscemi, 2006] # A devastating episode of perceptions: misinterpretation abounds, even from the people fearing it the most (ie, Tony). Then again, the biggest perceptive revelation—Vito's true identity, as a gay man, um, coming out into view—is deferred an episode by Tony's misguided attempt to reassert his power. Oh, man, men make bad choices.

Viewing Log #29: Spots like Fort Knox [1/11/10 - 1/17/10]

by Ryland Walker Knight

—Sixteen minimeters between me and you

• Jour de fête [Jacques Tati, 1949] # Straight from my notebook: J. Tati just gets it. Life's cycles, all circles, a merry-go-round of comedy. And why not have a laugh? The body's the best joke machine—it's your number one interface with the world. Life, for Tati, is bounded by one's capacities to move through this obstacle course; all we can do is hurdle and parry and jump; all we do is dance with things. Tati's definitely an artist of things. Things: a bike, a pole, a tent, animals, hills, fences, night vision (of a lack of it), booze, a piano. And everything circles back in the end. The world's too fast, too, it seems, for things to elude you forever. (Also worth noting: so much more dialogue than the others.)
  
• L'École des facteurs [Jacques Tati, 1947] A perfect little sketch for the bigger feature to follow.
  
  
• La Captive [Chantal Akerman, 2000] # Lots here, including Vertigo right off the bat and a lot of Levinas-like investigations of "the other" and how confrontation takes different forms. My second Akerman, believe it or not, and easily a right angle away from that linoleum-bound block of process that made her name. Still, makes me want, even more than normal, to see more movies made by women about women. There's a reason Bigelow gets a lot of pub: she's into boys in the way a lot of male filmmakers are into girls. But this one—this lady and her film (her films)—is all about how the differences in sex (during cinema, embodied in gender, across a windowpane) make a difference in how we act. Wild but true: this is Proust! Phew! Makes me want to know those books (that book?) all the more! I think I'll have more to say soon. (Also, I'll have more on Akerman when I finally get around to Icarus Films' recent release of D'est, which everybody assures me is an odd blood beauty.)
  
  
• The Sopranos "The Fleshy Part of the Thigh" (S6,E4) [Alan Taylor, 2006] Really great movement between threads in this one; written very well. And there's even a quick fade to black punctuation at one point, not to mention the treelines of the final moments moving from Tony's respite by the pool to Paulie's beat down of the Barone heir and then back again (twice!) to show what's in the background of all this big life of grab-all.
  
• The Sopranos "Mayham" (S6,E3) [Jack Bender, 2006] An underrated episode, no doubt, even though one might call the coma-world a bit of a reach; I, for one, totally dig all the cross-consciousness interaction because there are jokes, as ever, to go with the scares. Also, Paulie is amazing.
  
  
• Gone To Earth [Powell and Pressburger, 1950] Fucking fell asleep. Twice. I felt like an idiot. Still do. However, what I did see was pretty amazing, though Brian tells me I missed a lot of contextual "a-ha"s as the film closed.
  
  
• Fantastic Mr. Fox [Wes Anderson, 2009] # For a memory jog over breakfast I watched a few moments, got some laughs and a few notes.
  
  
• La Captive [Chantal Akerman, 2000] Amazing first eight minutes. Then an amazing cut to a title card, which prompted me to shut it off. I tried again the next night, but other things and people got in the way.

Viewing Log #28: Shape the way you play [1/4/10 - 1/10/10]

by Ryland Walker Knight

—Won't help to hold inside

• The Headless Woman [Lucrecia Martel, 2008] # I don't know why people said this was inscrutable. It seems perfectly open to me. Every edit matters and, though nothing's explicit, you have all the tools/information you need to reassemble this brain, this so-called mystery. There is no mystery, in fact, there's only the frame—windows, doorways, sometimes doors are windows, even a car is a frame filled in—and our Vero is forever pushed to its side. Sometimes she gets to throng up an image, but even then her eyes are often off to one side, or looking past this box of light she's in and making brim. I'd love to teach this film in a hermeneutics seminar. We'd read Ricouer and Bazin and Borges and Gadamer. I could keep watching this movie for the next month, but I won't; I'll probably just watch it once more then wait for it to screen in a cinematheque. I watched it with headphones, which certain felt apt and enveloping, but I can only imagine it packs more punch in the dark, sitting alone. (If I'd seen this in time for our double bills, I might have entertained the idea of writing about this flick and Gertrud, or Day of Wrath. It would have been the opposite of the pairing I did come up with—a true vision of light, of lightness even (however colored by hurt)—but sometimes you need the weight to better frame what bubbles up.)
  
  
• Up in the Air [Jason Reitman, 2009] Sure, that was fine; there were things to like. But, come on, how many condescending pats on the back do we need? I'm not advocating for some muddy road, per se, but Clooney's charisma can only do so much to make a shiny object, like this riveted thing all aligned, feel spontaneous. What's more, Vera Farmiga is gorgeous and talented and I wish to hell she would get a role that didn't flip her, however strong, into such an easy mark.
  
• The Sopranos, "Join The Club" (S6,E2) [David Nutter, 2006] # The best acting the show's got. Easily one of the best episodes ever, too. Would love to talk about this show and its silly brand of surrealism with Alain Resnais.
  
• The Sopranos, "Members Only" (S6,E1) [Tim Van Patten, 2006] # So good. Starts with Burroughs, ends with one of the biggest shocks in the series. I was surprised, again, at the ferocity of Junior's dementia. More inspired is the subtlety of that final segment's true structuring device: the pasta. We cut from Gene's suicide by hanging to Tony pouring spaghetti (I think) into boiling water, singing, and the episode ends with Tony gurgling in close-up as dinner continues to bubble under the image, signaling not only that this could, truly, be the end for Tony but that we've reached a definite point of no return; no matter what happens (we know now that Tony lives, duh) things will never be the same. Which, of course, goes against the whole ethos of the series finale (the whole series, really) which is all about how patterns so easily calcify while life marches on. I guess we're just talking a narrative turning point more than anything. And, again, the thing that separates this series from, say, The Wire is that its narrative is as brisk as it is brutal; i.e., its sidewinding always pushes something—some dread, some death, some delusions—forward.
  
• Tyson [James Toback, 2008] Mellow Mike is an amazing human being. Hell, Iron Mike was, too. The movie may be "so-so" but its story, his story, should be heard/seen. And in monologue form, what else can you ask for? Indeed, there's some cinematic play, here, too, with all this shifting and polyphony, but the real value of the film/video is its enduring status as a love letter.
  
  
• The Headless Woman [Lucretia Martel, 2008] So, yeah. This one. Best of the decade? Up there for sure. More soon, I trust. Until then, here's some of my favorite people/writers on this marvel (1) Martha (2) Danny (3) David (4) Koresksy [at No.2] (5) Glenn (6) Fernando (7) Sicinski (8) Nathan (9) Danny talking to Ms Martel. —Quick poll: where you at on the other two this lady's made?
  
  
• Death Becomes Her [Robert Zemeckis, 1992] Waiting for the plumber, I reacquainted myself with a few chunks (here and there) from this barf bag of grotesqueries. Maybe Phelps and Kehr are onto something: maybe Zemeckis really is some kind of special image'n'myth maker. I remember really digging the flick when my dad and I saw it in theatres, but, now, wow, it's like brand new (though still the same?). It's almost a toilet, though a shiny one, complete with shit and piss and pissy face-making. And in HD!
  
  
• In The Mood For Love [WKW, 2000] # Cuz of everybody's lists, and to wash that exacting movie out of my brain a bit before bed. I mean, wouldn't you rather dream about Maggie Cheung in form-fitting dresses more than eye-gouging and barn burning?
  
• The White Ribbon [Michael Haneke, 2009] # I don't want to say I saw through it the second time around but I think I saw through it the second time around. I've tried again and again to be charitable to this dude's movies since a couple people I love kinda love these flicks, but, at this point, fuck it. More soon, when it opens here in the Bay, but if you want to read a pan I nod with then you should read this bit of bile from Mr. Waggish.