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Post by Red Oak Kid on Feb 24, 2016 10:00:03 GMT -5
SCREAMING MIMI1958
I had never heard of this movie until I saw it a few days ago. It's unusual. Anita Ekberg is the main star. Phil Carey and Harry Townes are second leads. I guess you would call it a physiological noir. There is an interesting scene where Ekberg and Carey are talking in a darkened room with a blinking neon sign outside that alternately lights the scene and then plunges it into total darkness while the dialog continues.
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Post by Deleted on Feb 24, 2016 11:43:19 GMT -5
The Grifters (1990) John Cusack, Anjelica Huston, Annette Benning, Pat Hingle, Henry Jones The acorn doesn't fall far from the tree. Cusack is a low level scam artist. He finds out that his new girlfriend is a pro at that game but used to run bigger, Wall Street level scams. She wants to partner with him now for big game action. Cusack's mother makes a surprise appearence-he hasn't seen her in 8 years. She works with the mob, scamming the race tracks. Who can trust who? Novel by Jim Thompson, screenplay by Donald Westlake. That's a great literary pedigree. A fine noirish character drama with stellar performances all around. Nominated for many awards but didn't quite take any home. Nevertheless, a quality piece of cinema. Henry Jones' final role. Great movie and great performances from all involved. I remember being surprised by the ending of the movie when I first saw it. It fits the film perfectly though considering the subject matter.
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Post by Ish Kabbible on Feb 24, 2016 13:48:46 GMT -5
SCREAMING MIMI1958 I had never heard of this movie until I saw it a few days ago. It's unusual. Anita Ekberg is the main star. Phil Carey and Harry Townes are second leads. I guess you would call it a physiological noir. There is an interesting scene where Ekberg and Carey are talking in a darkened room with a blinking neon sign outside that alternately lights the scene and then plunges it into total darkness while the dialog continues. Is that the film that begins with Anita Ekberg taking a shower? One of many reasons its a classic
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Post by Red Oak Kid on Feb 24, 2016 16:19:39 GMT -5
SCREAMING MIMI1958 I had never heard of this movie until I saw it a few days ago. It's unusual. Anita Ekberg is the main star. Phil Carey and Harry Townes are second leads. I guess you would call it a physiological noir. There is an interesting scene where Ekberg and Carey are talking in a darkened room with a blinking neon sign outside that alternately lights the scene and then plunges it into total darkness while the dialog continues. Is that the film that begins with Anita Ekberg taking a shower? One of many reasons its a classic Yes, but that scene is pretty tame compared to several other scenes she has in the movie. She plays a stripper and her act is shown but she doesn't take anything off.
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Post by Deleted on Feb 24, 2016 17:59:55 GMT -5
I'm an Anita Ekberg Fan, and I did not care for Screaming Mimi at all because I find this movie pretty tame and like Red Oak Kid pointed it out - this movie is not all that cracked up to be. I watched it once and did not care for it at all.
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Post by Red Oak Kid on Feb 24, 2016 18:19:52 GMT -5
I'm an Anita Ekberg Fan, and I did not care for Screaming Mimi at all because I find this movie pretty tame and like Red Oak Kid pointed it out - this movie is not all that cracked up to be. I watched it once and did not care for it at all. I can certainly understand your view and I would have to agree that as a movie, if it had not been for Ekberg, I probably wouldn't have watched the whole thing. I'm still not sure what the point of it was. And I thought Harry Townes went way over the top in some of his scenes. But on the other hand, the fact that it is so different, makes it interesting to me. I'm not sure what the film makers were trying to say. I suspect that having Ekberg sign on was the main reason it even got made.
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Post by Red Oak Kid on Feb 24, 2016 18:30:41 GMT -5
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Post by Ish Kabbible on Feb 24, 2016 18:35:58 GMT -5
Forgot that it came from a Fredric Brown novel. I really enjoyed so much of his SF and mystery books And didn't remember Mimi and Bird With The Crystal Plummage were both adaptations from the same. How about that And DVDBeaver.. Good god, I haven't been to that website in such a long time. Back when I was building up my DVD collection it was a font of great info along with DVDTalk
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Post by dupersuper on Feb 24, 2016 22:10:58 GMT -5
The Grifters (1990) John Cusack, Anjelica Huston, Annette Benning, Pat Hingle, Henry Jones The acorn doesn't fall far from the tree. Cusack is a low level scam artist. He finds out that his new girlfriend is a pro at that game but used to run bigger, Wall Street level scams. She wants to partner with him now for big game action. Cusack's mother makes a surprise appearence-he hasn't seen her in 8 years. She works with the mob, scamming the race tracks. Who can trust who? Novel by Jim Thompson, screenplay by Donald Westlake. That's a great literary pedigree. A fine noirish character drama with stellar performances all around. Nominated for many awards but didn't quite take any home. Nevertheless, a quality piece of cinema. Henry Jones' final role. Not according to IMDB...
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Post by Ish Kabbible on Feb 24, 2016 22:45:59 GMT -5
The Grifters (1990) John Cusack, Anjelica Huston, Annette Benning, Pat Hingle, Henry Jones Henry Jones' final role. Not according to IMDB... I should have phrased it Henry Jones final theatrical role. He did subsequent TV work. dupersuper on the job.
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Post by Ish Kabbible on Feb 25, 2016 0:40:11 GMT -5
Rawhide (1951) Tyrone Power, Susan Hayward, Hugh Marlowe, Dean Jagger, Edgar Buchanan, Jack Elam, George Tobias, Jeff Corey
Tyrone is tending to an isolated Pony Express way station. Susan Haywood is staying there briefly with her little daughter. A gang of outlaws headed by Hugh Marlowe are holding the three hostage, waiting for a stagecoach to arrive carrying a fortune in gold bullion
A real fine hostage drama westerner. Glad to find another unseen Tyrone flick in my collection and this one's a winner. Haywood is a gutsy broad and the outlaw cast of character actors is a treasure trove. It runs 87 minutes, a good quick pace and an excellent rousing finale
IMDB says its the inspiration for Quentin Tarantino's The Hateful Eight. Quentin can pick them
TV broadcasts changed the movie title to Desperate Siege to avoid confusion with Clint Eastwood's western TV series
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Post by Ish Kabbible on Feb 25, 2016 3:56:35 GMT -5
About Schmidt (2002) Jack Nicholson, Kathy Bates, Hope Davis, Howard Hesseman, Dermot Mulroney
Warren Schmidt is 66 years old and just retired as an insurance company VP. His wife soon dies suddenly of a blood clot and his daughter is getting married to someone he can't stand. He lives in a daze and embarks on a journey in his RV.
As I get older, there are a few movies that become more and more meaningful as I begin to relate to them better. Two of them feature Mr.Nicholson. First is Carnal Knowledge from the early 1970s dealing with the relations between men and women as they get older. This is the other from Nicholson. Its humor subtly creeps up on you and yet its pretty insightful on the meaning of life.
Nicholson has starred in so many of my favorite films. This I feel has been his last 4 star performance (hopefully I'm premature but I think he said he's officially retired). A very good movie and classic Jack
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Post by Rob Allen on Feb 25, 2016 11:36:16 GMT -5
Don't Look Now (1973) Donald Sutherland, Julie Christie Directed by Nicolas Roeg Laura and John Baxter had lost their young daughter in an accidental drowning. They are now in Venice where John, as an architect, is working on a church renovation. His wife encounters 2 elderly sisters-one of them is a blind psychic. The pyshic tells Laura Baxter that she sees the spirit of her dead daughter following her mom, and warns the couple to leave Venice immediately Good news is it's a film recently re-released via Criterion with many supplements. I'm kind of conflicted with this movie The Good-beautiful direction from Roeg, evocative location shots of Venice. These are not the typical tourist scenes I've seen of the city but rather what seems as the back streets (or rather back canals), the oldest, grimiest sections of Venice and hence, the spookiest. Sutherland and Christie perform an infamous, long , explicit sex scene. The Bad-languidly paced and no real chills during the story. I haven't seen this in decades but I remember liking it more than you did. It was really creepy and atmospheric, kept the viewer off-balance.
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Post by Deleted on Feb 25, 2016 15:25:25 GMT -5
I just can't wait for tomorrow night on TCM ... Close Encounters of the Third Kind and Young Frankenstein ... back to back on Friday!
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Post by Hoosier X on Feb 25, 2016 17:41:34 GMT -5
Here's some round-up summaries of the notable movies I've seen in the last week or so:
Our Dancing Daughters (1928) - This is a very watchable, very entertaining film of the late silent era. I've been wanting to see it for more than 20 years because I saw it on a "50 Best Silent Films" list and also because it's the film that made Joan Crawford a star. But I always hesitated about watching it because it looked like a bit of a chore and not really my kind of movie.
But it's really very good! I wouldn't recommend it to people with no interest in Joan Crawford or silent films, but for film fans who, like me, hesitated because it looked like a bit of a slog, I say take a chance! It's a silent film, but it has a synchronized soundtrack, so instead of listening to organ music, you hear orchestra music chosen specifically for the film, so the dancing scenes make rhythmic sense. There's also sound effects, like waves when they're at the beach, car noises when they're in traffic and you can hear ping-pong balls hit the table when they play pong-pong. It's amazing how much more watchable some of these later silent films are when they have a synchronized soundtrack.
You'll quickly see why this movie made Joan Crawford a star. Anita Page is also really amazing in this movie! She gets to be the bad girl for a change.
Dangerous (1935) - Bette Davis won her first Academy Award for this movie and I've been wanting to see it for awhile. I found it very entertaining. So I guess I'll recommend it to people who like dramas from the 1930s about broken-down, alcoholic actresses who jinxed everybody they ever loved and they get another chance - and screw that up too. It's only eighty minutes! And you get to see Bette Davis recite "Romeo and Juliet" before collapsing in a dive bar.
Moontide (1942) - A fun drama that pretends to be film noir for a while before giving up. The selling point is the cast. Jean Gabin, Ida Lupino, Claude Rains, Thomas Mitchell. Not only are they all great but the movie gets extra points for being so weird! Everybody seems to have walked in from a different movie.
The Lost Weekend (1945) - This movie won the Oscar for Best Film in 1945. Ray Milland won Best Actor. Billy Wilder won Best Director. I saw it 25 years ago and I've been wanting to see it again for years. It may not be the best movie ever made about addiction but I think it's the most entertaining. The scene where Ray Milland gets the DTs is one of the most unnerving sights in 1940s cinema. All that shrieking!
Father of the Bride (1950) - This was nominated for the Oscar for Best Picture in 1950. I think 1950 is a pretty good year, what with Sunset Boulevard, All About Eve, Caged and Born Yesterday. So I've been curious about Father of the Bride for a while. It has its moments. Spencer Tracy is really good. But the film tries too hard to make the father look foolish. The daughter is the one that looks bad, kind of snotty and stuck-up and oh so dramatic. Not that Elizabeth Taylor isn't pretty awesome in the role. I wasn't impressed with the script at all. This was nominated for Best Picture but Caged wasn't?
Z (1969) - I was in the mood for a political thriller and I was not disappointed by Z at all. I'm usually fairly indifferent to Yves Montand but he's good here and I liked seeing Jean-Louis Trintignant and Irene Papas. It wasn't at all what I expected it to be. It's not quite as good as Investigation of a Citizen Above Suspicion. But what is?
I also saw Juarez (1939), which was something of a unique cinema experience, and I'm planning on writing that up later.
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