Phillip's comments (member since Jul 29, 2009)

Phillip's comments from the Movies We've Just Watched group.

Dr Jeckyll and Mr Hyde (Victor Fleming, 1941).

It is fascinating to think that just two years after making The Wizard of Oz, Victor Fleming set out to film Robert Louis Stevenson's tragic yarn on the duality of man. As it turns out, there are more similarities than you might imagine. Both movies boast great music scores, hypnotize the viewer with dreamy montages that tantalize and terrify, and traverse the inner playgrounds of good and evil.

Spencer Tracy is really something in both roles and his transformations are more subtle than what you find in most monster flicks. Both Jeckyll and Hyde have shared elements that create a lot of tension throughout; the gentle throated Hyde simmers before terrorizing Ingrid Bergman in Sadean interiors while Dr Jeckyll argues morality publicly with the Victorian status quo with a tinge of manic obsession.

Speaking of Bergman, the portrayal of her descent at the hands of Mr Hyde is as disturbing as a league of winged monkeys to a small child. She is able to maintain a vulnerable dignity typical of her work that keeps her performance from losing humanity long after she reaches the depths of spiritual desperation.

Young Lana Turner has a relatively easier role in that she has to convince us that good Dr Jeckyll is madly in love with her and that their love will enable his salvation. The script she has to work with doesn't have nearly the emotional range that Bergman has to wrestle with, but her cherubic beauty has the grace of a good witch from the north. In the end she has to confront her man on both sides of the curtain that separates benevolent wizard Jeckyll from fire-breathing Hyde.

Are the films so different? Indeed, they are as different as men and women.

The main similarity is that both Dorothy Gale and Henry Jeckyll take that long days' journey into the night of the soul (or, if you are one of those stubborn rationalists, you may prefer to think of it as the unconscious mind). In The Wizard of Oz, our heroine has the luxury of family and community to call upon in the creation of her inner army. The collective Dorothy of brains, heart, and courage survives her battle with the dark side, while Stevenson's protagonist falls prey to his obsession with distorting the laws of nature and a desire to conquer inner turmoil with the sole assistance of the rational mind (and a few mega-doses of mind-altering stimulants). In terms of basic masculine/feminine archetypes, Dorothy represents a restorative matriarchal nature while Henry reveals a destructive, warring patriarchal tyrrany.

orphan...were we discussing that one? if so, i have forgotten about it (sorry, sometimes there's a lot on my mind). i will go to netflix and look it up now. thanks for reminding me.

dead man came before ghost dog...

yeah, i heard there wasn't much going on in jarmusch's newest. i re-read that great bfi film studies essay on dead man (absolute favorite jarmusch) earlier this week. highly recommended if you like the film. it's listed on my film bookshelf if anyone is interested in checking it out.

i just watched goodbye uncle tom, easily one of the weirdest films i've ever seen, and i don't necessarily mean that in a good way. it's a mockumentary on slavery by an italian film crew, produced in 1971. i can't really describe the direction, but imagine if jodorowsky made a documentary on slavery. highly exploitive, a biting satirical tone, and cartoonish characters, none of which melds together easily. i won't be able to recommend it until i get over the shock of some of the imagery. the box says "makes roots seem like an episode from the jeffersons. not sure i agree. pauline kael called it, "the most graphic and rabid incitement of the race war". that might might just be an apt assessment.

i have yet to see american history x.

forgot all about good will hunting, or rather that it was a van zant film.

i saw fritz, but not the nine lives sequel. now i know who directed it! and, really? the mighty mouse cartoons? from the 60's? wow, i would never have guessed the same director. i rember seeing some ads (magazine) for cool world, but never saw it. i will put the cool and the crazy in my netflix queue.

ps
who is ralph bakshi?

nice list, jim!

i forgot about david fincher and van zant (although he has had some ups and downs, which i can also say about several of the directors on my list). but ol' gvz has made a few films that i just loved: drugstore cowboy, milk, and paranoid park...i was completely captivated by river phoenix's performance in my own private idaho, but keanu really stunk it up in a few of his scenes. i think i liked a lot of the ideas in elephant more than the actual execution.

what are your favorite van zant films?

matt,
primal fear - 1996
american history x - 1999

the 39 steps is my favorite hitchcock film. i know it's not as polished as some of the later masterpieces, but it shows all the seeds of hitchcocks's talent. it's funny and clever and ahead of its time, me thinks. robert donat and madeline carroll have wonderful romantic chemistry and tension, and there are a few vintage sight gags and tricks that numerous filmmakers have paid homage. if you like north by northwest, you might just enjoy this early british prototype that fused hitch's wrong man motif with a cross country chase and romance.

you know me, always placing a thorn in the glass slipper...

anyone that has both chuck jones and tarkovsky in their list is all right by me

dear nausheen,

ahhhh, i'm sorry, what i meant was that i was at home with a bad cold...
i live in oakland, and at the moment i am home, not on the road.

i think i saw that long ago on an airplane. wasn't that edward norton's big breakout role? he plays kind of a psycho that gere (a lawyer) has to defend?

i just added topsy turvy to my netflix queue.

ariadne,

i LOVED sweetie and recommend it highly (based on your favorite director list).

but i haven't seen two friends. years ago the castro did a night of her early short films, which i liked a lot, but can't remember any of the titles....

sam,

i think there is a positive message to angel at my table: artists transcend personal suffering and make it into art. i suppose that is positive in itself, but suffering isn't pretty any way you cut it. certainly not janet frame's particular brand of suffering. unfortunately, the film doesn't display a lot of frame's poetry, so you don't walk away really getting what came out of her "circumstances". i went out and bought a few of her books after seeing the film. that was all the more satisfying.

but in the end, frame overcomes a great deal of personal adversity in order to simply become herself. i have personal experience in this realm. it isn't easy to constantly make sacrifices. but if you stick with it, beyond the odds, you might even be recognized (as frame was) in your own lifetime.

wow! i stand corrected! this is clearly a day where i am being called on the carpet.

i hope you liked angel at my table nonetheless. it's not every day that a film can deliver such a powerful story.

whoops, that was a mistake, thanks for catching that (given how many of my mistakes you have caught, i suppose i should be paying you for editing duties...)

i have corrected it.

oh, all right, i'll take a whack at this. impossible to list all time favorite director. there are too many amazing stories from too many places, so i'll do it by country:

africa
ousame sembene

america
david lynch
coen brothers
john waters
stanley kubrick
howard hawks
john cassavettes
john huston
mary harron
roger corman
richard linklater

australia
(early) peter weir

canada
david cronenberg
atom agoyan

czech republic
(early) milos forman
jan swankmeyer

denmark
carl dreyer

france
jean-pierre melville
agnes varda
catherine breillat
(early) jean-luc goddard
jean cocteau

germany
werner herzog
rainer maria fassbinder
margaretta von trotta
fritz lang

great britain
alfred hitchcock
david lean
mike leigh

india
satayjit ray

iran
abbas kiarostami

italy
federico fellini
vittorio de sica
michelangelo antonioni
pier paolo pasolini
sergio leone
lina wertmuller

japan
yasujiro ozu
akira kurosawa
nagisa oshima
seijun suzuki
kyoshi teshigahara

new zealand
(early) jane campion

poland
andrej wajda
krzysztof kieslowski
roman polanski

russia
andrei tarkovsky
larissa shepitko
aleksandr sokorov
sergei eisenstein

spain
luis bunuel
pedro almodovar

sweden
ingmar bergman

*Nausheen aka StarPr!nce$s* wrote: " Phillip: i've been home sick for a few days

where is it? and are you really adopted?..."

where is what? my home?
yes, i'm adopted. why would i make something like that up?

djll,
notorious and strangers on a train are outstanding. tim and i have been trying to articulate our top 5 hitchcock films for a few years now and always have a hard time narrowing it down.

i've been home sick for a few days and have had a little movie marathon to nurse me back to health:
an angel at my table
all about my mother
now, voyager
the blob (original)
north by northwest

next up:
claire's knee
attack of the 50 foot woman
strangers on a train

..and it's no wonder why i like those films so much!

(but when do we get months of rehearsals, tom?)