The Contenders:
Amelie
Gosford Park (winner)
Memento
Monster’s Ball
The Royal Tenenbaums
Showing posts with label Gosford Park. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Gosford Park. Show all posts
Friday, November 18, 2016
Friday, October 24, 2014
Friday, July 11, 2014
Saturday, April 12, 2014
Gosford Park
Format: DVD from DeKalb Public Library on laptop. 
Ah, Robert Altman, you complete son of a bitch! I’m almost always conflicted on the films of Altman. I can see the craftsmanship here. It’s impossible to deny that the man knew what he was doing behind the camera. But his films also have so many characters to pay attention to, so many lives to become embroiled in and to keep separate. Gosford Park has a cast of dozens, and many of them are intended to be important to us in the course of the film. This is not a situation with a couple of key characters with a cast of one-dimensional background players. No, we’re supposed to know who everyone is, even after a short introduction. It’s a short-term Downton Abbey, and evidently, there’s a quiz at the end.
That’s the biggest issue with virtually all of Altman, at least in my opinion. With Gosford Park, we not only have a house full of minor nobility and rich people, we also have all of their servants, and one thing we’re supposed to keep in mind is who works for whom. On the surface, Gosford Park is a murder mystery of the old school, Agatha Christie sort, despite the lack of a convincing Hercule Poirot character. But that’s just on the surface.
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