Small Tragedies

Film: Sundays and Cybele (Les Dimanches de Ville d’Avray)
Format: DVD from NetFlix on laptop.

2018 has not been kind, and we’re only a week in. On the third, a woman turned directly in front of my wife on the road, causing an accident. We’ll find out tomorrow if our little Fiat is going to be totaled or not, and Sue is battered, bruised and currently on heavy medication. My father’s wife has had a medical procedure with some complications. My mom has pneumonia. Just this morning, an ambulance showed up to take one of my neighbors to the hospital. It’s been a week of tragedy to start the year. Naturally, the film that showed up from NetFlix was Sundays and Cybele (Les Dimanches de Ville d’Avray in the French), a movie that more or less defines the concept of tragedy.

I’m of two minds with something like this. On the one hand, a film like Sundays and Cybele fits in with the sort of mood I’m in right now. Sometimes, when it feels like the world is crashing about one’s ears, it can be satisfying to revel in that feeling. In that respect, this was almost the perfect film for me today. On the other hand, sometimes when things seem to be constantly spiraling downward, we want an uplift. Based on that, this was absolutely the wrong choice for today.

Die, Yuppie Scum!

Film: Afterglow
Format: Internet video on laptop.

I have a serious confession to make about the movie Afterglow. I started watching this movie several days ago and stopped about 40 minutes in. There’s a specific reason for this. Every year for the past few years, I have tracked everything I watch on Letterboxd, creating a new list each year. Because I watch a little more than a movie every day, I access this list frequently, and because of how Letterboxd works, I see the top few entries of the list every time I go to it. The thought of spending an entire year having to look at the poster for Afterglow was something I didn’t want to happen because I knew it would piss me off.

Yes, I hate this movie in a way I typically reserve for white supremacists, television preachers, and people who don’t use their turn signals. This is the sort of movie that appears to have been written by people who have too much money and no real problems for people who either want to live in a world of too much money and no real problems or already do and think their non-problems are the most important things in the world. Everyone in this film is hateful, stupid, selfish, and not worth anyone’s time. This is cinematic solipsism, desperate navel gazing masquerading as being meaningful. Sorry for the rant (there will be more later), but sometimes I need to get this kind of thing out of my system.

Oscar Got It Wrong!: Best Director 1958

The Contenders:

Richard Brooks: Cat on a Hot Tin Roof
Stanley Kramer: The Defiant Ones
Vincente Minnelli: Gigi (winner)
Robert Wise: I Want to Live!
Mark Robson: Inn of the Sixth Happiness

Vampire (More than a) Weekend

Film: The Transfiguration
Format: DVD from DeKalb Public Library on laptop.

The last couple of years have been great for horror movies. Living in a world that seems to be constantly and continuously spiraling out of control on many fronts often has that sort of impact on the genre that deals specifically with both the real and unrealistic fears of the world. When a genre gets this sort of creative bump, there are going to be films that are left behind, ignored and overlooked. The Transfiguration is one of those films. Listed as a 2016 release, it didn’t really hit theaters until April of last year, and then made such a small ripple that not many people seem to have heard of it.

It’s also not a particularly easy film to classify. It is very much a film that plays on vampire lore, making it a vampire film in many ways. It is also not entirely clear if it is a film that wants to accept the supernatural aspects of vampirism or instead wants to travel down the road more or less paved by Martin. Are we dealing with a real vampire here or are we simply dealing with a very disturbed and disturbing young man?

Wednesday Horror: XX

Film: XX
Format: DVD from Sycamore Public Library on laptop.

Say what you will about anthology films like XX, there is a section of the market that likes them. I can go either way with them. On the one hand, I appreciate that in horror anthologies, there’s not a lot of filler, mainly because there isn’t any time for filler. Since the film has at most about half an hour to go from start to finish, we’ve got to get down to it right away. The downside of an anthology is that we never really connect to the characters.

That lack of connection is important. For me, at least, horror works in only a couple of ways. The best horror connects us deeply with the characters, gives us some incentive to want them to be successful or at least survive, and deals with the existential problems of life. True, deep existential horror is difficult, but wonderful when it’s achieved. That takes time, though, and in an anthology film, time is exactly what we don’t have. What that means is that we’re going to get the cheap horror film answers here: jump scares and gore. With XX, there’s a real desire in some of these shorts to attempt that deeper horror. There’s just not enough here.

Garbo Speaks!

Film: Anna Christie
Format: DVD from personal collection on laptop.

I have gotten into the habit of picking up odd movies now and then when I find them. Most of the time, these are movies that I know I’ll need to watch for one list or another. I don’t just buy indiscriminately, though. Many that I buy are notable in one way or another. That’s the explanation for why I own a copy of Anna Christie. Sure, I knew I’d have to watch this eventually, but I bought it not just for that but because it’s also Greta Garbo’s first talkie. Fans who had desperately wondered what she sounded like finally got their chance.

What this means is that Anna Christie is an interesting piece of film history. It also means that it doesn’t have that good or that interesting because it relied on this gimmick to get people to go see it. What we’re going to get instead is a pretty straightforward melodrama focused on Garbo’s character with some assistance from Charles Bickford, Marie Dressler, and George F. Marion.

Oscar Got It Wrong!: Best Picture 1971

The Contenders:

A Clockwork Orange
Fiddler on the Roof
The French Connection (winner)
The Last Picture Show
Nicholas and Alexandra