Month 42 Status Report

June has come and gone. I managed my goal of 25 films off the list, barely, but I made it just the same. This leaves me with 85 films to review, which will almost certainly not happen in the 92 days leading up to the release of the next edition of The List.

That's okay, though. My plan was to leave a film or two back anyway. I didn't want to finish only to have to restart again a week or two later because more films were added. No, I'll still be done by the end of the year, but I won't finish up before the 10th version arrives.

June was a good month--I got through a few films I was worried about, for one thing. I also took out the longest film I had left, which always feels like an accomplishment.

The summer months await. July will see another 25 (at least) going down, and with luck, I'll do a couple more than that. The issue I'm starting to face is films that I've simply avoided up to this point. There are still some I'm excited to see and others I'm excited to see again. But there are still a couple that worry me or that I know I dislike. More troubling, though, are the films that I simply have no interest in. I'll need to work through as many of those this coming month as I can. The good news with those is that they also tend to be the films that surprise me the most.

Riding in Style

Film: Le Carrosse D’Or (The Golden Coach)
Format: Streaming video from Hulu+ on rockin’ flatscreen.

How do I explain a film like Le Carrosse D’Or (The Golden Coach)? Roger Ebert used to talk about films that had what he called an “idiot plot,” a film in which the whole plot could be short circuited by someone saying or doing a specific thing at one point in the course of the film. In the case of this film, the issue is entirely one of personal pride. Everyone has an ego the size of a truck, and the entire film is these egos banging into each other.

So here goes: in a small area of South America, a magnificent golden coach is delivered to Ferdinand (Duncan Lamont), the viceroy of this Spanish colony. Also on the boat is a troupe of actors, the most relevant of whom is Camilla (Anna Magnani), the star of the show and evidently the most irresistible woman in the world. Also on the boat is her current squeeze Felipe (Paul Campbell).

Not Even the Cleavers are Really the Cleavers

Film: Far from Heaven
Format: DVD from personal collection on laptop.

One of the things I have really enjoyed about watching all of these films on the 1001 Movies list is the number of interesting discoveries I’ve made. Not only have I found a bunch of films that I really like, I’ve also discovered directors whose work I will now start seeking out. Todd Haynes is one such director. I’ve seen two of his films now and while the biggest similarity is the presence of Julianne Moore, there is a strange connection between them. Haynes comes across as a more socially acceptable David Lynch, or at least one who hits some of the same topics without all of the concomitant weirdness that goes along with Lynch. In other words, if you want to like Lynch or think you should but just can’t, try something by Todd Haynes.

What makes a film like Far from Heaven interesting is that it deals with some modern issues, but in the context of the 1950s. What we can freely and openly talk about—in this case homosexuality and interracial relationships—were taboos to the point of the ideas being non-existent in the world of this film.

Less God, More Devil

Film: Deus e o Diabo na Terra do Sol (Black God White Devil)
Format: Video from The Magic Flashdrive on laptop.

Glauber Rocha’s Deus e o Diablo na Terra do Sol (Black God White Devil) belongs to a special class and category of film. This is a “dust people” film. Everyone in the film lives in a blasted wasteland where it seems nothing should be able to survive. The men act like impoverished men, meaning they do everything they can to dig themselves out of the pit they live in and waste their money and effort foolishly. They all dream big and exist with a sullen look in their eyes. The women are beautiful in a way that only suffering can create and frequently look like they are about to collapse. It’s the sort of film that makes you thirsty watching it; everything is covered in a thin (or a thick) layer of grime, and the people eat with their fingers from bowls by grasping bits of food and throwing it into their mouths.

So it’s one of those films, where we will witness the poor and downtrodden become poorer and more downtrodden as life and the wealthy conspire against them, leaving them with nothing but their pure and honest faith to pull them through. Within the first 20 minutes, our main character Manuel (Geraldo Del Ray) brings 12 cows to market, but has four die from bad water and snake bites. He’s told by his boss that the dead cows are his loss and he is responsible for them. Oh, the downtroddening starts right away. So it was incredibly surprising when our poor, oppressed hero whips out his machete and kills his boss. Really, I was expecting something like Vidas Secas and found myself smack in the middle of Jimmie Blacksmith.

Watching Oscar: Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World

Film: Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World
Format: DVD from personal collection on laptop.

Of all the movies I like a lot, there is none that I’ve gotten more grief for than Peter Weir’s Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World. At least three other bloggers have metaphorically rolled their eyes and groaned when I have brought this up as a great film. I stand by my assertion that this is a film worthy of respect. I like it, perhaps more than I should, but I like it all the same. It’s the sort of film that I never get tired of seeing. Having watched it, I’d happily consent to watch it again immediately.

War movies are a genre I don’t love or hate, but I genuinely love naval warfare films. Many of my favorite films in the military genre are either prison films or naval films. Master and Commander (I’m shortening the title from here on out) takes place in the time of wooden ships and iron men, smack in the middle of the conflict between England and France, when Napoleon was in charge of a good chunk of Europe. With Europe under Bonaparte’s boot, the war became one of naval engagements far from home.

Cycle Killer

Film: Sombre
Format: DVD from NetFlix on laptop.

I try to find the good in everything I watch. It may not always seem that way, but I genuinely do. Because of that, it’s not that easy for me to say that Sombre is an ugly film. It’s ugly to look at, ugly in effect, and ugly in intent. It’s the sort of film that makes me want to take a shower after watching it; I felt unclean, not unlike I felt after watching Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer. It’s no coincidence that the two films cover much the same territory.

Ostensibly, Sombre is about a man name Jean (Marc Barbe) who follows the Tour de France in his car. As it happens, he also strangles women as he goes. It appears initially that he finds a victim, usually a prostitute, at each stage of the Tour and kills her either before or during sex, then dumps the body before moving on. This is displayed to us in the most brutal way possible—there’s no music, nothing really but the really awful noises of someone losing her life at the hands of a psychopath.

Messiah Complex Blues

Film: Ordet
Format: Streaming video from Hulu+ on laptop.

I wanted to say that I tend to have a mixed reaction to the films of Carl Theodor Dreyer. I was genuinely moved by The Passion of Joan of Arc and genuinely bored by Vampyr, although it did have a distinctive look. And then I remembered that Dreyer was also responsible for Gertrud, a film that I believe concerns itself with the romantic life of mannequins. I went into Ordet with some hopes, but I tried my best to keep them moderate. Dreyer’s work has moved me to question why I watch these films, but it’s also given me one of the truly remarkable film experiences I’ve had doing this.

Ordet is a film that seems to touch more on the Passion side of things, but certainly has some connection to Vampyr as well. It is very much a film about religious faith and the lack of faith. It is also about the problems caused by differences of faith, familial duty, miracles, and insanity. Sounds pretty good, right?