by Sam Juliano
Labor Day. Summer’s End. The arrival of September. The time the year’s most prestigious movies are released. The opening of the opera and classical concert season. The launching of the NFL Season. The final weeks of MLB. The start of cooler weather. The opening of the school year. Back to work for some late vacationers. Lucille, the kids and I will be attending a holiday barbecue at the home of our lifelong friends Tony and Sara Lucibello today (Monday, that is). A nice group, including my brother Paul and his family, and some cherished friends will also be in attendance.
The Romantic countdown is set to examine the Top 25 tomorrow. Its hard to believe that three-quarters of the marathon project is complete, but here we are in the final lap. The superlative quality of the writing continues, and no doubt will continue to right up until the final entry on October 6th. It has not been an easy endeavor for a number of people -myself included- but in just five weeks many will earn a well-earned extended rest. Many thanks to those who have taken the time to comment and follow the unveiling, and especially to the writers, all of whom have worked their tails off to offer unique new interpretations of the films that landed in the countdown.
With all the responsibilities related to school both from the work angle and to our own kids attending -not to mention that the last two weeks have been utterly dreadful for new film releases – we did not venture out to see very much. We did however see one new release, which was actually a Hungarian film that originally opened in the home country and screened at Cannes:
A Nagy Fuzet (The Notebook) **** (Saturday) Quad Cinemas
A NAGY FUZET is a harrowing Hungarian film that displays one of the most painful coming-of-age stories imaginable. The allegorical film, set in 1944, features twin brothers (Laszlo and Andres Gyemant delivering extraordinary performances) who adapt to hunger and abuse after they are sent to live with their alcoholic grandmother in the countryside to protect them for the constant war aggression. The film is strikingly photographed in muted colors that evoke painterly hues. The bleak ending will disturb some, but one of the film’s most admirable traits is its steadfast avoidance of sentimentality.
Enjoy your Labor Day. And the best to you over the new school year. I’ll be watching for your children’s book reviews.
Thanks so much for stopping in Celeste, and thanks too for all your support over the past months. As soon as this romantic countdown is complete I will be in large measure shifting my focus to the Caldecott books indeed. The very best to you and yours for the holiday!
The final weeks of MLB.
More to the point, it’s the final weeks — days, even — of the northern-hemisphere cricket season. Luckily, there’s a spare hemisphere . . .
Not much watched here recently, but I’ve enjoyed Black Widow (1954; the one with Heflin, G Tierney and Rogers, based on a Patrick Quentin novel) and Une Manche et la Belle (1957; Isa Miranda, Henri Vidal and Mylene Demongeot); the latter is the best James Hadley Chase adaptation I’ve ever seen — not the highest of bars, of course, but it clears it by some distance.
I hear ya John! There are some striking similarities between cricket and baseball, though it is rare to find someone who will declare they like both. I did get a charge out of the cricket “match” in HOPE AND GLORY between Ian Bannen and Sebastian Rice-Edwards, and there has always been someone else at this site who has sung the game’s praises. I am sure you’ve played the game, much as I have baseball. So now you are saying the southern hemisphere adherents will be filling in the gaps during the U.K. off season. Nice.
I know you liked those two films, as per your appreciative (and stellar) reviews at NOIRISH, which I strongly recommend to readers.
Best wish to you and Pam over the holiday weekend my friend! 🙂
Hello Sam,
Hope you will be enjoying the get together today. We are having a low key day here as the kids start school tomorrow so we’re trying to get them to bed early tonight. Was going to see Boyhood last night but a last minute change of plans prevented it. Will have to wait I guess.
Watched The Double last night. Wasn’t very impressed and Jesse Eisenberg has very limited range as an actor.
We did like The Railway Man though. Well acted film that conjures genuine feelings. I found that I liked it more than I expected.
That’s my brief update! Have a great week!
Jon—-
Thanks so much! We did indeed have a great time at our Labor Day barbecue, meeting up with a few friends we hadn’t seen in years, and of course with our erstwhile hosts, lifelong friends we see regularly. I can certainly relate with you on the matter of getting the kids to bed early for the first day of school. I am sure we will be comparing notes on BOYHOOD very soon. Have not seen THE DOUBLE, but be rest assured I am in no hurry. Ha! Interesting positive report on THE RAILWAY MAN! I wish you all the best on this very hectic week, and as always for your stupendous support and cherished friendship! 🙂
Happy Labor Day, Sam, and to everyone at WITD.
Can’t believe we’re down to the last 25 entries in the Romantic Countdown. It has flown by so quickly. I’m far behind in my comments on the most recent entries,due to being overwhelmed at work, so one of my goals for this rainy Labor Day is to catch up on my fellow bloggers’ fine work on this effort.
The Chicago International Film Festival, which kicks off next month, is starting to announce some of its lineup and I’m anxious to get the full schedule so I can plan which film to attend. I made it to 3 films last year, hope to get a few more in this year.
The Hungarian film sounds worthwhile, yet grueling. I hope to get to it at some point.
I managed to watch a good amount of film and quality TV, despite a hectic work schedule. I binge-watched the third season of HBO’s VEEP over several weeknights – brilliant, scathing comedy and Julia Louis-Dreyfus completely deserves the multiple Emmys she’s won. I also watched a couple of previously unseen classics – THE LAVENDAR HILL MOB (delightful Ealing comedy) and – on the other end of the spectrum – John Schlesinger’s SUNDAY BLOODY SUNDAY (exceptional acting from Glenda Jackson and Peter Finch, plus some great, atmospheric scenes of early ’70s London that gave the story some interesting context.). Also watched 2013’s KILL YOUR DARLINGS; while I continue to be impressed with Daniel Radcliffe’s range and talents, I was not terribly impressed with the film overall.
Finally, I caught a matinee yesterday of Rob Reiner’s latest, AND SO IT GOES. It’s a predictable, underdeveloped feel-good story of unlikely romance between a curmudgeonly widower and a heart-on-her-sleeve widow, and it shouldn’t work – but somehow Michael Douglas and Diane Keaton manage to conjure some genuinely affecting and touching moments out of an uninspired screenplay. Not great, but better than it had any right to be.
Good luck to you , Lucille and the kids on another school year!
Hope you had a splendid Labor Day Pat! The temperatures have really risen in these parts, and we are looking at 90 over the coming days. I am assuming you are in the same boat, though your rain does seem like a temporary relief. Ugh. Yes, the countdown has really moved forward. I had thought when it started that we were in fro an endless run, but time never leaves any prisoners. All things considered I am very pleased with it and the high-quality writing it has produced. The days of the 200 and 300 comment threads that we saw during the incomparable musical countdown of a few years back are gone. Nothing will ever touch that project ever. But we have held our own, and I think we are on good ground to realize our plans for the Best Childhood Films countdown in the Spring. I have never seen VEEP, but am intrigued by your glowing regard. I also was not all that impressed with KILL YOUR DARLINGS, and remember giving a low grade on a past MMD. I do however have the highest regard for SUNDAY BLOODY SUNDAY (great acting indeed!) and THE LAVENDER HILL MOB. You have penned a beautiful capsule here on AND SO IT GOES, which I have not yet seen. i like that concluding coda: “Not great, but better than it had any right to be.”
Thanks so much for the every nice words about the school year which officially started for the kids today! I wish you the very best always my friend! 🙂
Postscript: Forgot to mention the Chicago International Film Festival you are excited about. Wish I were out there for it, but will follow your reports closely. That festival always brings a number of great films, including some premieres! As to the Hungarian film, it is grueling for sure, but it works.
Sam –
September — one of my favorite months — triggers so many wonderful things. I enjoyed reading your list of what this month launches.
As I type this, you and yours are enjoying one of my other favorites: the ever-delicious BARBECUE!
I’m going to take a pass on seeing A NAGY FUZET. I think it would simply break my heart.
Make it a shiny penny kind of week!
Laurie—-I am completely with you on the affection for September. I always look forward to it, and hold out the red carpet for the autumn season. And yes so many things are set into motion at this time. We all enjoyed the barbecue, and I stuck with the grill chicken only – am back to being very strict as a result of some high sugar readings due to carelessness. Have been dieting big-time! Can’t blame you on A NAGY FUZET. Definitely a disturbing experience. I wish you and a Len a fabulous week! Thank you as always my friend! 🙂
Hello Sam and everyone! Enjoy your free day! The year is coming to an end and we all must celebrate!
Here are the films I saw last week:
– The Birds (1963, Alfred Hitchcock) ***** A masterpiece from the Master of Suspense, and let’s admit it, he was also a Master of Horror. Maybe he didn’t think much of the genre itself, specially since until the 1960’s it was mostly a minor one, filled with low grade science fiction creature movies that filled the drive-ins, but he surely managed to get a magnificent work of art and of technical proficiency in this movie. You just need to read or watch any documentary on the making of this film to notice that this isn’t just some throw-away film he made in hopes to cash in, or to maintain some kind of “name” he had made for himself after ‘Psycho’ (1960), but it’s one of the most audacious shoots and projects that had come to the studio until that point. Never mind the big epics with the thousands of extras, they are easy to handle, let’s just think for a moment that he had to handle fake, mechanical, real and trained birds, and all of them had to look exactly as real as the next one, that is a feat that no one has even come close to, hence the lack of any other great movies about birds attacking people (just think of the semi-official sequel to this movie and all the Birdemics of the world that we might not know of yet).
Tippi Hedren might not be great in this movie, but her sweetness and cocky attitude of the first half of the movie compensates any other mistakes that she might have in the second half, and nevertheless she finds herself as a strong female figure that ends up so damaged that we can’t but feel pity of her. Specially when it comes down to the harsh and incredible attitude that the last scenes, how the physical damage done to Hedren was almost real most of the time, and how the construction and the editing of those pieces are done so that they are effective.
The film works, it’s scary, it manages to create a mood, it’s claustrophobic and at the same time like a silent film, it manages to summon up the dread that would happen if confronted with a situation like this.
– Evolution of a Filipino Family (2004, Lav Diaz) ****1/2 Now, this might sound like a joke to you, but I might need to re-watch this movie.
I’m serious, it’s considered among the longest films ever made and yet I still think that a second viewing would bring forward every element that I missed in it, specially when it comes about the linear storyline, and how the jumps and cuts between different stories made the world deeper and not more confusing, as I was thinking while the film constantly changed.
There are some interesting elements to take into account here that need the re-watch: the significance of the radio soap opera as some kind of established narrative for the Filipino, while movies tried hard to go beyond those elements, thus becoming a good way of talking about movies inside movies.
This is a movie that relishes over 20 minutes to a slow death sequence, not because it’s spectacular, but because we’ve come to know him as the representation of our hopes of everything coming along fine in the movie, and he’s killed off, and our feelings sink with it.
This movie is something else. Maybe this is not the best source, but I was curious about the ending of the film, and this is the only online thing that I found that talks about it, and at the same time is explaining a lot about what I think the movie was trying to achieve.
http://ulan-shiela.blogspot.com/2008/01/ebolusyon-ng-isang-pamilyang-pilipino_12.html
That’s all, I’m confused and I’ve spent a week watching this movie whenever I had free time. I think it was worth it.
– El (1953, Luis Buñuel) ***** What an incredible movie from Buñuel, it is said that this might be the most perfect representation of paranoia. Jealousy is a damaging characteristic in some people, and this might be an exaggeration, but is it ever not intriguing and just awesome to watch someone go through that hell. More will come out of this, I’m sure.
– The Strange Portrait of the Lady in Yellow (2004, Helene Cattet, Bruno Forzani) **** Forced perspectives. Giallo colors. Murder. Forzani + Cattet approaching their style.
– Level Five (1997, Chris Marker) ****1/2 You Can (Not) Change History.
– Las niñas Quispe (2013, Sebastián Sepúlveda) **** What a great character study that manages to make sense of every decission. Chilean film soon to be reviewed somewhere else.
– Los olvidados (The Young and the Damned) (1950, Luis Buñuel) ***** This is one of the harshest, meanest, more heartbreaking films ever made, and it’s not as talked about as other movies out there. Maybe its origin is what truncates its appraisal, maybe it’s that same stuff about how mean and harsh it is, how people shy away from it because it is that mean against kids and their parents and the ambient they live in, the government that doesn’t protect them and everything else. And what is worst: not much has changed.
That’s all Sam, have a great week!
Well, Jaimie, Hitch actually thought quite a bit of horror as his long-running landmark television series “Alfred Hitchcock Presents” can attest to. But THE BIRDS is certainly one of his two horror masterpieces, and I much appreciated your fabulous capsule review of it here! As you say it does work, and it is scary and the shoot was wholly audacious! You make one great point after another if I might say so. i do think Ms. Hedren is most fine here all things considered. And what a beauty! So thrilled to read you gave both EL and LOS OLVIDADOS five stars each!!! They are both five star films for me too!!! LOS OLVIDADOS is one of the most disturbing films I have ever seen in my life. The killing and the surrealistic aftermath offer up some unforgettable imagery. Yes, paranoia and jealousy are brilliantly transcribed in the often hysterical EL, which features that superlative scene in the tower, when our protagonist refers to people as ants. These are two of my absolute favorite Bunuels!! You have me extremely intrigued with that Lav Diaz film! I have seen two other films by him but not this one I’m afraid. I will investigate further momentarily. Still great to see the very high rating. Haven’t seen those other three but am especially interested in Marker’s LEVEL FIVE and the Chilean film.
A banner show here Jaimie!! Really one of your most brilliant reports ever!!! Thank you so much and have a fabulous weekend my friend! 🙂
Sue and I got back late last night Sam! Two weeks of bliss, though a little hotter than I would have liked. So we’re back in the saddle. I wish you and Lucille a great year. We all need to catch a break. Talk soon. Will play catch up with the countdown today!
Welcome Back Peter!!! Looking forward to hearing all about it! You deserved that break and the respite for all the usual daily obligations. Yes, back in the saddle indeed. I wish you and Sue the very best as always my friend! 🙂
Go Jints!!! Let’s hope our team starts the year with a win in Detroit on Monday night. Hope this school year brings you much joy Sam.
The Giants had a great pre-season Tim, but some prognosticators are saying they could be in for a rough year for a number of reasons. Let’s hope they start with a win in the Motor City! Thanks so much my friend! Have a year too!
Hope it was a great holiday party and that you relaxed and enjoyed it immensely. I am not sure I could enjoy another depressing movie or book right now – things seem to be so dark these days, I hope the new releases will be better.
My friend Liv was in town on Labor Day so took me to an Italian Dinner for my 65th birthday celebration – so nice to drag out these big events. And lo and behold The Film Society had a showing of THE BOYFRIEND at 6:30 pm – the small theater was packed and we recognized so many of our friends and so graced the curb for several hours afterwords to visit and check in with friends.
We loved the film and did not think it was dark or unenlightening at all – it will be a classic of innovative production I am sure of it. Funny me, I could not recognize Ethan Hawke until he grew 12 years older! and I could not remember Patricia Arquette’s first name until I saw the credits! With unanimity we all celebrated the last line of the film -trying to remember it exactly. That Seize the Moment is backward is all that we could rightly remember so we made up the next phrase to be THE Present is right now… and threw it at each other as a blessing as we headed for home. Folks were dancing that the movie had come to town so quickly for our wants…
I also was able to watch the whole Season 5 of Parenthood on Netflix this weekend – What an amazing series and so captures the role of parenting and teaching and values and communities. Of course, they all had lots of funds, but maybe just a few people could identify through this fictional family a bit of what my experience as a a parent has been – the frustration temper tantrums when a bright/ brilliant kid can not get along in school or at home… I can not believe all the people who don’t know this excellent series – certainly my kind of entertainment.
I also finished GRAIN BRAIN the book – excellent Neurosurgeon taking on all that we know about health, nutrition and learning…. MY BELOVED WORLD by Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor….was my other personal read this weekend.
Back on tour with a book of poetry re: women’s erotica and then a whole series of high adventure murder mysteries to solve…. 30 more reviews for the end of the year….
Love the sparkly Labor Day side bar
( Still quite ill with this post operative infection, but how sweet it is to have health insurance and Medicare – maybe I can even get my elbow helped?- optimistic)
Thanks so much for the fantastic comment Patricia! I have missed your input, but know well how hectic life can be day to day. Yes I concur we need to put the clamps on all the depressing stuff. I shudder when I think of the number of wakes and funerals I’ve been to over the last five months. Mind you a number were for people who had reached a ripe old age, but it’s never a happy time in any sense. Here’s to a much better time over the coming months and throughout 2015. The 65th is significant Pat -I am officially 5 years behind you, after turning the Big 6-0 in late August as well- so it should have been treated as an event. I am trusting you all enjoyed a fabulous Italian dinner. I must enjoyed your fantastic anecdote on the screening of BOYHOOD and all of your superlative regard for it. I’ve stated it a few times at WitD, but I’ll say it again – it is the best film of 2014. I am more than skeptical that another film can or will replace it by year’s end. The way Ethan Hawke was made up in youth was apparently very convincing then! Count me sad to say as one who has not yet immersed himself in PARENTHOOD. Your glowing recommendation speaks for itself, needless to say. Like just about everyone I am all over the place, and just can never find time to alter an already loaded schedule. But it is also true that when one really wants to do something they MAKE time. I REALLY want to read Sonia Sotomayor’s book! That GRAIN BRAIN offers some promising benefits as well. That sparkly sidebar is the work of our longtime dear friend Dee Dee, who is unceasing in her devotion to keeping the place lively and colorful. Please get well very soon my friend! And yes, why not get the elbow included?
Thanks again, and have a terrific upcoming weekend.
Sam, As always, I am looking forward to another fall season of films, books, music, and cooler weather. Here in Fla., we have had more than 26 days above the average which is around 90 or 91 and there seems to be no relief in sight. Anyway, on a better note, I am participating in a few exhibits in the coming months including one that just opened yesterday.
On the movie front…
The Normal Heart (****1/2) Gut wrenching and touching autobiographical adaptation of Larry Kramer’s play about the early days of the AIDS epidemic. Powerful performances from Mark Ruffalo, Julia Roberts, Jim Parsons and others.
Life of Crime (***1/2) Based on Elmore Leonard’s novel The Swtich. Leonard’s novels have had mixed results when transferred to the screen with Out of Sight, Get Shorty and Jackie Brown at the top and both versions of The Big Bounce and Be Cool scrapping the bottom. This Jennifer Aniston starring film lands somewhere in the middle. Aniston is surprisingly good.
Natural Born Killers (***1/2) Outrageous over the top satire that hits and misses it targets. Good performances from Rodney Dangerfield and Tommy Lee Jones.
Blessed Event (****) Terrific pre-code with Lee Tracy giving a machine gun speed performance as a gossip newspaper columnist. Lots of sharp dialogue add to the pleasures.
Dorothea Lange: Grab a Hunk of Lightening (****) – Terrific PBS documentary on the great photographer made by her granddaughter.
W. Eugene Smith: Photography Made Difficult (***) As one of the great documentary and photo essayist Smith deserves a better film than this.
Bill Cunningham New York (****) Still another documentary on a photographer. Bill Cunningham is not in the same class as Lange or Smith. He admits he is no artist but what he does he does well. Cunningham is a well-known photographer in the fashion street photographer, for lack of a better terms. At over 80 years old he is still working for The New York Times.
As always, have a great week!!!
Sam, As always, I am looking forward to another fall season of films, books, music, and cooler weather.
John, as always you and I seem to be regularly on the same wave length. I know you guys have really had a sweltering summer. We have only just (over the last five or six days) experience that 90 degree heat, and ironically it came after a relatively cooler August. Go figure. Great news about the upcoming exhibits! Hope you have some posts planned for Facebook! As to the films you have seen this past week, I’m afraid I can only vouch for seeing two: BLESSED EVENT (a fabulous pre-coder, every bit what you say it is here) and NATURAL BORN KILLERS. I know people who love it and others who hate it. Remarkably I am in accord with you and would rate it 3.0 or 3.5. I’d love to see THE NORMAL HEART especially of the films you have engagingly offered capsules for, but BILL CUNNINGHAM NEW YORK and DOROTHEA LANGE sound great! Not sure what I’d make of LIFE OF CRIME, based in part what you say here. Hope the coming week brings you lower temperatures my friend. The best to you and Dorothy!
Sam, I want to wish you and Lucille a great school year. I trust Lu is feeling good, and you guys have everything under control. I just left a bunch of comments under the romantic countdown entries. The best 40 minutes I invested all week!
David!!!!!!!!!!!!!! OMG!!!!!!!!!!! I was stunned to see that many comments registered in one sitting, and typically stupendous comments at that. You have been sorely missed at the site, and especially during this Romantic Films Countdown, but you have certainly made up for lost ground in a big way today! I completely understand you’ve been all over, and frankly blogging should never be more than a diversion. Only a very few of us incurables take it a step further. Yes we do have everything under control. She has been taking avanex since last summer’s diagnosis, and has not not had am much as a single exacerbation in a full calendar year. Doctors say that is excellent.
Looks like you invested more than just 40 minutes my friend. Thanks so much for your kind words and for engineering the biggest single comment attack in one day in the site’s history. Ha! Have a great week my friend.
Sam, I hope you had a wonderful Labor Day and apologies again for the late reply here.
I loved reading your feelings on A NAGY FUZET. It sounds like a film I would really like. I will need to keep an eye out for it over the next few weeks.
This week, I took in two films, both of which greatly moved me – Ozu’s GOOD MORNING and Welles’ THE IMMORTAL STORY. Ozu as you know is a relatively late discovery for me but with each film I only become more impressed and more curious to seek out ALL of the rest. The Welles film is one of the few of his I had never seen. Like Ozu, his genius just seems so evident and awesome with every new film of his I see. And with Welles, what always impresses me the most is how he is able to transcend incredible economic limitations, such as he surely had with this one, and still express one of the most grand styles the cinema has ever known.
Hope you are having a great week. Thanks so much, Sam, for all that you do!
Jeffrey—-
Your contributions here are never late, but rather are a blessing and are deeply appreciated. A NAGY FUZET has certainly stayed with me, and is one of the best films I’ve seen over the past few months I’d say. I am fairly certain you will register a positive response. Thrilled to hear you have continued to find some much cinematic bliss with the great Ozu, and GOOD MORNING is certainly an utterly charming feature. Yes I know he is rather a late discovery, but you have made up for lost time with a bevy of glowing reports. 🙂 Welles was surely a guy as you note that managed to overcome economic limitations to do some of the greatest work of all-time. We are having another hectic but fruitful week my friend. I can never thank you enough for your generosity and support over so long a time–you are truly one of a kind!!! Have a terrific week!