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Post by Prince Hal on Jul 5, 2016 12:15:52 GMT -5
White Christmas. She is great as Kaye's dance partner early on, even saving the number when Kaye missteps with a graceful move. Always felt bad for her. Supposedly she suffered so from anorexia or bulimia, or both, that her costumes (not sure when this began) were designed with a turtleneck to cover the early aging effects (wrinkles and sagging skin) related to her condition. There is debate about this, so I don't want to assert her eating disorder as incontrivertible fact, but I do think the evidence is strong that she struggled with an eating disorder at least off and on. She also suffered from terrible arthritis. Her career was much shorter than it could have/ should have been. When her daughter died of SIDS in 1963, she essentially withdrew from the world and lived the life of a recluse. Died in 1981 of cancer, only 60 years old. That is truly sad if true about the eating disorders. It certainly is believable though looking at her in White Christmas. She's extremely thin and her waist is just ridiculously small. What's worse, they always say that the camera adds ten pounds. During the "Choreography" and "mandy" numbers in particular, she just looks so thin.
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Post by berkley on Jul 5, 2016 15:32:53 GMT -5
Smoke from 1995. Really, really interesting movie of redemption and self discovery that centers around a local cigar store and it's clientele. Kind of has the feeling of Kevin Smith's Clerks about it, but with a little bit more insightful thoughtfulness to it. For example, the film opens with a question, "How do you measure the weight of smoke? That's like trying to weigh a man's soul"Really stellar performances from Stockard Channing and Forest Whitaker, which isn't to discount the other actors/actresses, because they're equally as good There's a kinda/sorta sequel called Blue in the Face that's also very enjoyable. [edit:] perhaps "companion piece" would be a better description
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Post by Rob Allen on Jul 6, 2016 15:18:19 GMT -5
Also, blackface is always hilarious! I saw a movie a few weeks ago when I was visiting my mom back East. I'm not certain that there was actual blackface but there was a scene where Phil Silvers performed a medley of Southland, Dixie's Land, All Over God's Heaven, Shortnin' Bread, Indian Dance and Climin' Up Dem Golden Stairs. He used a fake Southern accent (the character wasn't a Southerner) a few times during the movie, including that medley. The movie was Something For The Boys, a flag-waving musical made during the war (1944). The romantic leads, Michael O'Shea and Vivian Blaine, were apparently big stars then but their fame has since been eclipsed by that of their comedic co-stars, Phil Silvers and Carmen Miranda. The story is about an old mansion in Georgia that's near an Army base. The mansion's new owners want to rent rooms to the wives of soldiers stationed at the base, and they put on musical shows to make money for the renovation. Yes, Carmen does a couple of numbers with fruit on her head. This was the film debut of Perry Como, who sings a couple of songs, and of Rory Calhoun, and the third film for Judy Holliday. A pleasant enough movie but not one of the classics of the genre.
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Post by The Captain on Jul 6, 2016 21:33:59 GMT -5
I DVRed On the Town (1949) and I decided to watch it tonight. It's great! It lives up to its reputation better than some of the other musicals of the era. (I saw Guys and Dolls a few weeks ago and I was disappointed. It has its moments but a lot of it is kinda stupid.) On the Town has a lot of the same people as Take Me Out to the Ball Game. Gene Kelly, Frank Sinatra, Jules Munshin and Betty Garrett. And Ann Miller in place of Esther Williams. I love them both, but Ann Miller in the mix gives you a very different kind of CRAZY ENERGY! And you also get Vera-Ellen, who I don't think I've ever seen in a movie before. She's great! Yeah, On the Town really kicks butt and shows no mercy to the unwitting spectator who gets caught in its web. We are all prisoners of Manhattan. "On The Town" and "Take Me Out to the Ballgame" are two of my wife's favorite movies, along with "Singing in the Rain". She is a HUGE Gene Kelly fan and will watch any of his movies whenever they are on (except "Brigadoon", which she hates), even though she owns all of them on DVD also.
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Post by Gene on Jul 9, 2016 19:04:29 GMT -5
Barnes and Noble is having their 50% off sale on the Criterion Collection this month, so I picked up the Lady Snowblood collection. I was thinking about taking a shot of whiskey every time I saw a shot in the films that Tarantino stole for Kill Bill, but I want to have functioning kidneys in the morning.
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Post by Hoosier X on Jul 10, 2016 14:33:07 GMT -5
Barnes and Noble is having their 50% off sale on the Criterion Collection this month, so I picked up the Lady Snowblood collection. I was thinking about taking a shot of whiskey every time I saw a shot in the films that Tarantino stole for Kill Bill, but I want to have functioning kidneys in the morning. Meiko Kaji is so awesome! If you liked Lady Snowblood, check out any of the Female Convict Scorpion movies that she made. Especially the first two! And Tarantino is pretty awesome as well. The Hateful Eight was my favorite movie of 2015. A unique cinema experience if there ever was one.
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Post by Gene on Jul 10, 2016 14:59:49 GMT -5
Barnes and Noble is having their 50% off sale on the Criterion Collection this month, so I picked up the Lady Snowblood collection. I was thinking about taking a shot of whiskey every time I saw a shot in the films that Tarantino stole for Kill Bill, but I want to have functioning kidneys in the morning. Meiko Kaji is so awesome! If you liked Lady Snowblood, check out any of the Female Convict Scorpion movies that she made. Especially the first two! And Tarantino is pretty awesome as well. The Hateful Eight was my favorite movie of 2015. A unique cinema experience if there ever was one. There's a new Blu-Ray set of the Female Prisoner Scorpion movies listed on Amazon as coming out later this month. It's a little pricey, but that's what the wish list is for. I like Tarantino a lot, too. The only 2015 movie I liked more than Hateful Eight was Creed.
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Post by Deleted on Jul 10, 2016 15:52:01 GMT -5
I just watched Some Like it Hot ... Starring Marilyn Monroe, Tony Curtis, and Jack Lemmon today on TCM and it was a well rounded movie with lots of laughs in the right places and some good drama, suspense, and among other things as well. It was on Turner Classic Movies today and I haven't seen it for a while and I wanted to watch it anyway for fun and I'm a fan of the big three of Monroe, Curtis, and Lemmon.
George Raft was memorable as Spats Columbo and Nehemiah Persoff as Little Bonaparte was excellent too!
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Post by Hoosier X on Jul 10, 2016 18:33:44 GMT -5
I'm about halfway through Decision Before Dawn (1951). (I took a break to get a drink.) Geez Louise! It's one of the best World War II movies I've seen for a while!
It's France - 1944. The Allies are recruiting German POWs to go back into Germany and get information and perform spy missions. Wow! Richard Basehart, Gary Merrill and especially Oskar Werner are all really good in this! When I took a break, Werner was running around wartorn Munich and Nuremburg masquerading as a Luftwaffe solider trying to get back to his unit. I'm a bit confused on what his mission actually is, but it's pretty suspenseful so far.
I DVRed it on a whim (it's the only Best Picture nomination for 1951 that I've never seen so I've been sort of keeping an eye open for it) and I'm glad I did!
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Post by Rob Allen on Jul 10, 2016 22:15:56 GMT -5
"On The Town" and "Take Me Out to the Ballgame" are two of my wife's favorite movies, along with "Singing in the Rain". She is a HUGE Gene Kelly fan and will watch any of his movies whenever they are on (except "Brigadoon", which she hates), even though she owns all of them on DVD also. I love both Brigadoon and On the Town; I'm less familiar with Take Me Out to the Ballgame. What's your wife's issue with Brigadoon? Does she dislike Lerner & Loewe in general or just this one? I'm a big L&L fan.
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Post by Bronze Age Brian on Jul 10, 2016 22:42:55 GMT -5
Watched Mosquito (1995) recently re-released by Synapse Films. I love movies that are "so bad they are good" (example: Troll 2). Mosquito pretty much lived up to those expectations. The acting is dreadful, in a boring kind of way. Nothing to laugh about there, but there is a charm in the giant mosquito puppets and the way they drain people's blood until their eyes pop out. Also a great homage to Night of the Living Dead as the remaining survivors take refuge in a house and quickly board the place up in hopes of surviving the night. Little do they know that the mosquito breeding ground is right underneath them in the basement. Fun bad summer movie schlock!
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Post by Hoosier X on Jul 11, 2016 18:51:22 GMT -5
Today on YouTube Theater: A*P*E (1976). I wanted to see this when I was a kid but I don't think it played near us and even if it did my mom didn't take us to EVERY stupid monster movie just because we held our breaths until we died. I noticed A*P*E was on YouTube a few months ago and I decided to watch it today while I was doing laundry and making breakfast. It's pretty bad. I've seen some pretty bad movies in my time, like Manos, the Hands of Fate, Monster-A-Go-Go and Robot Monster, and A*P*E may not be down into that category, but it just misses by a whisker. It's without a doubt the worst movie I've seen in some time. Hillbillies in a Haunted House and Sex Kittens Go To College look like Citizen Kane or Wild Strawberries in comparison. A giant ape (36-feet high) is being transported by ship to an amusement park. The ape escapes and wreaks havoc around Seoul, Korea, for 86 minutes. There are various people whose exploits we follow during the beast's rampage. There's an American actress who gets abducted by A*P*E. Twice! And her reporter boyfriend. And the American military officers charged with capturing the beast. And a Korean woman who amuses her children with marionettes to keep their minds off the fact they are about to be eaten by A*P*E. This movie's worst sin is that it's boring. The dialogue is painful to the ears. One of the Army officers is very short-tempered and he's and the phone a lot, getting mad and yelling at people while his junior officer assistant looks concerned and embarrassed. I believe this is supposed to be funny. But it's so badly written and so badly acted that it's just painful. One somewhat amusing moment occurs when A*P*E causes a helicopter crash and then displays his black furry middle finger at the smoldering crash. (The idea that someone thought this was funny is much more amusing than anything we actually see on screen.) South Korea is very lucky that there's no international cinema organization policing movie production around the world or they might have put South Korea on quarantine and told them "No more movies, Korea! This is for your safety as well as that of other nations!" Pretty bad. For very devoted bad-movie aficionados only.
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Post by Hoosier X on Jul 11, 2016 22:29:34 GMT -5
Did anybody else DVR The Sea Chase? I read the summary on the TCM schedule - apparently John Wayne is a German submarine captain! I'm not sure if it's World War I or World War II or if John Wayne is the one being chased or the one doing the chasing. But a movie with John Wayne as a German sub captain - that's a movie I want to see!
I'll probably be watching it in the next few days.
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Post by Roquefort Raider on Jul 12, 2016 8:17:25 GMT -5
Today on YouTube Theater: A*P*E (1976). It looks like something The Asylum would produce!
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Post by Hoosier X on Jul 12, 2016 9:03:12 GMT -5
I made a mistake about The Sea Chase. John Wayne isn't a submarine captain, he's a German freighter captain trying to get back to Germany at the start of World War II.
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