In no particular order …
The Third Man
I bought this because, even though Criterion is massively double-dipping these days, a two disc set of one of the greatest films ever made is still worth it. Besides, I didn’t buy it the first time around. What I found with TTM is that the more you see it, the more you love it and the more you find little strange bits to captivate your imagination. I think I’ve rented the previous version 3 times on Netflix and before that had seen it on TCM and even further back, had seen it in film school (that brief semester I tried to get into the UCF film program … ah, I could have been one of the “Blair Witch” kids … but, alas, it was not meant to be.)
The first thing anyone talks about when they mention TTM is Orson Welles as the supposedly dead Harry Lime. For years Orson put around the rumor that he had co-wrote and pretty much co-directed this film, which seems credible in that it is visually as striking as Citizen Kane and contains many of the Mercury theatre’s classic “stepping on” dialogue techniques … but, the film was entirely written by Graham Greene, directed by Carol Reed. However, Orson did contribute one adlib during the shoot:
"In Italy, for thirty years under the Borgias, they had warfare, terror, murder, bloodshed — they produced Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci and the Renaissance.
In Switzerland, they had brotherly love, five hundred years of democracy and peace, and what did that produce? The cuckoo clock."
After spending almost an entire hour waiting for Harry Lime/Orson Welles, he slips in and steals the show. It is what he did best. The bonus features are numerous, including a 90 minutes documentary called “Shadowing the Third Man” as well as a nice period “Omnibus” special on the author Graham Greene (who mysteriously refused to be filmed while the interview was conducted on the Orient Express.)
TTM might be a Criterion double-dip, but it is worth it.
El Topo – Catching up on my Alejandro Jodorowsky box set and this one was supposed to be the masterpiece.
El Topo (The Mole) first popped up in 1970 and is an “allegorical western.” However, it really is just a total mind-fuck. Jodorowsky was famously called John Lennon’s favorite filmmaker and, since “El Topo” is an Abco film, we can assume it has been entangled in all kinds of post-Beatles red tape most of this time. However, it does claim to have invented the midnight movie …
I am a fan of Santa Sangre (a much later Jodorowsky film) so I knew, more or less, what to expect. His bizarre obsession with circus freaks, religious figures, and inexplicable narrative structures all come to the front in El Topo. It isn’t for the faint of heart ... and, frankly, doesn't really make sense, either.
Danger Man – Caught up on a few episodes of Danger Man during the rainy mornings. Quite nice to watch such a well-done show in black and white during a morning rain storm. There is something very comforting about it.
X-Men (trilogy) – Yes, man cannot live on bread alone. As I’ve said before, I strive to maintain a balanced diet and a little sugar goes a long way. Watching all 3 X-Men movies I was struck exactly the same way I was a year ago when X-Men 3 came out … this is more like episodic TV than individual films and no single one is better than the others. In fact, they are stronger as a whole than individually. X-Men 3 is a much better film than the critics allowed for largely because these aren’t really serious films in the first place.
Venus – Well, frankly I couldn’t get through this at all. Dreadful and creepy. I felt very sorry for Peter O'Toole who clearly thought this would win him an Oscar.
I spent an awful lot of time on Saturday and Sunday either reading or watching documentaries. A 2-part special on the possible finding of Nefrititti’s tomb from 2003 (I think) and a 4 part series on The Inquisition. Both were not very well done and, frankly, I was bored.
I have also been reading the first collection of Hunter S. Thompson letters.
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