Movie Night with Urbaniak: Battle of Algiers
urbaniak has been talking about watching Battle of Algiers since we watched Z a year and a half ago. I have always held Z up as my model of authenticity, a political thriller that really makes you feel like you are there watching history unfold. Now I have seen Battle of Algiers, a movie that, in terms of capturing a historical moment, makes Z feel as authentic as Fiddler on the Roof.
Eastwood report: The Enforcer
Harry Callahan is angry again, which is a good thing, but now he’s a little too angry, and his anger is a little too general — he’s not angry at anything in particular, he’s just kind of angry. Situations that used to make him squint and sneer and move on now get him hopping mad. He seethes and grimaces throughout The Enforcer, looking for a target for his free-floating rage.
Apologies
I have crossed over to the other side of the footlights for a few days, shooting some bits and pieces of a new webseries concocted by Mr. James urbaniak and myself. There was not only food, but nudity. The results will soon be found on a computer near you — perhaps even the one right now on your lap! Normal blogging will resume soon.
Recent movies viewed: The Public Enemy, Kung Fu Panda, Eraserhead.
Query
A new project has crossed my desk, one which will require me to familiarize myself with the Bollywood musical, a genre which with I am utterly unfamiliar. And so I turn to you, my hip, multiculturally-saturated readers, to educate me. What are the landmarks of the genre, the key works, the inarguable masterpieces? Who are the undisputed masters, whose filmography is unmissable, which stars express the purest expression of the form? As James Cameron is to action movies, as John Ford is to westerns, as Vincent Minnelli is to musicals, who best represents Bollywood?
I thank you in advance.
Eastwood report: Magnum Force
Magnum Force does the respectable sequel thing and turns the original on its head, or perhaps inside-out. If Dirty Harry is about society’s need to have tarnished knights who look out for the rights of the many, Magnum Force is about society’s need to be protected from those who would circumvent due process in their zeal to punish. In other words, it’s about Harry Callahan confronting the world he helped create in the original movie.
Eastwood report: The Beguiled
I gotta say, The Beguiled took me by surprise. It’s an extreme rarity for Eastwood, a movie that takes his character and puts him in a situation where he’s utterly out of his depth, where his skill set doesn’t serve him, and, most importantly, he doesn’t figure a way out of his troubles.
Natasha Richardson
I am shocked, nay, stricken by the news of the death of Natasha Richardson. Back in the 1980s, she was, all by herself, a good enough reason for me to go see a movie. I loved her as Mary Shelley in Ken Russell’s absolutely stark-raving-mad Gothic, then as Patty Hearst in Paul Schrader’s movie of the same name, then in The Handmaid’s Tale and again with Schrader in The Comfort of Strangers. I knew that if Natasha Richardson was in it, it was bound to be smart, daring and a little bit crazy. I regret not seeing her on stage in New York when I lived there and she doing O’Neill with Liam Neeson. I have nothing else to offer, except my deepest sympathy for her family.
Eastwood report: Coogan’s Bluff
It’s instructive, cinematically speaking, to watch Coogan’s Bluff and Dirty Harry back to back. A star/producer and a director, working in consonance, on modern-day urban police thrillers, three years apart, and yet Dirty Harry still rivets the viewer’s attention while Coogan creaks and groans.
Eastwood report: The Rookie
The Rookie is known these days as "The Movie Clint Eastwood Made Just Before Unforgiven." Looking back on it now, it almost seems designed as a supreme fake-out: knowing he had his masterpiece in his hip pocket, Eastwood lowered everyone’s expectations with this formulaic, rote cop-buddy movie.
Some more thoughts on Watchmen
I’ve been thinking a lot about Watchmen this week, which I think is a good sign, and paying attention to the online response to it. I’ve seen everything from "This movie is evil and you are evil if you want to see it" to "It puts me into a state of homosexual panic because it shows the penis of one of the characters" to "My favorite panel was not dramatized in the way I imagined and therefore Hollywood is evil and should be destroyed."