Certified Copy (Abbas Kiarostami, 2010)
FM / TRCS (Coleen Fitzgibbon, 1974)
Found Film Flashes (Coleen Fitzgibbon, 1974)
Internal System (Coleen Fitzgibbon, 1974)
Princess of Montpensier (Bertrand Tavernier, 2010)
Restoring Appearances to Order (Coleen Fitzgibbon, 1974)
Beauty and the Beast (Juraj Herz, 1978)
"Cutting Cards" (Walter Hill, 1990), episode of Tales from the Crypt
"Dead Right" (Howard Deutch, 1990), episode of Tales from the Crypt
Like You Know It All (Hong Sang-soo, 2009)
Little Big Soldier (Sheng Ding, 2010)
Little Big Soldier (Sheng Ding, 2010)
On Tour (Mathieu Amalric, 2010)
The Suspect (Robert Siodmak, 1944)
The Suspect (Robert Siodmak, 1944)
"The Switch" (Arnold Schwarzenegger, 1990), episode of Tales from the Crypt
7 comments:
Thoughts on the Kiarostami?
And thoughts on the Fitzgibbons?
Ferdman,
Unlike a lot of the people who saw this Cannes (and, apparently, Matthew Flanagan), I think it's what you'd call a "major film." Ben Sachs and I (we saw it at the same time) may be doing some sort of conversation / text about it in the immediate future, but for now I'll just say that I think those who've described the film's plot as "ambiguous" and "playing with ambiguities" are wrong, and that the events onscreen are totally unambiguous and that this is key to Kiarostami's subject / approach in the film. It is also an ardently romantic film in a very unfashionable but true way. It made me want to get married.
ZC,
As a program (I reviewed it for this week's Reader), the Fitzgibbons are mixed -- however, I like Restoring Appearances... quite a bit.
Internal System, the one that had been talked up the most, is pretty goddamn dull and after 20 minutes (45 minute total running time) I was kind of convinced I was watching a parody of '70s "academic" experimental film. The "remake" version (which you can find on YouTube) is much better.
I'm glad you like it! I saw it a few months back at Karlovy Vary (it was my favorite (new) film of the festival.) Oddly, it sort of reminded me of A Countess from Hong Kong--people going through the motions of dutifully acting out the antagonisms of a relationship with both parties knowing exactly how they feel/where the play’s going.
I remember grooving on Internal Systems because I am (probably) an uncritical sucker for things like it - an impulse to embrace films that seem perfectly willing to let me zone out if need be (cf. that Kiarostami interview from the '90s, the watching of which was very important to my formative cinephile self). Looking back on what I wrote in response to the Fitzgibbon program when I saw it a while back, she herself said that IS was basically a gesture of, "You want structural film, I'll give you structural film!"
(And I had the good fortune of seeing Sandra Gibson give a presentation on her preservation work for the movies ... thanks for that digital "remake" tip, I didn't know it was on yt.)
That first paragraph was meant to have one more sentence: 'So your inclination to regard the film as a parody would seem to be on-target.' ...
ZC,
In case you're interested, there's another Fitzgibbon program in town in addition to the Conversations at the Edge one. It's on the 15th and features films that aren't going to be at the Film Center: http://www.whitelightcinema.com/Fitzgibbon.html
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