Favorite films

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Recent reviews

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  Opus IV 1925

  ★★★★ Watched by Alan Newnham 24 May 2022

  The final Opus film and Ruttman's last completely abstract film, accompanied by an excellent 2008 soundtrack by Helga Pogatschar that is significantly more fitting than the previous more typical orchestral soundtracks of Ruttmann's time (though even more fitting would have been a musique concrete soundtrack that Ruttmann would later explore on Weekend in 1930).

  Ruttmann's Opus series starts with a focus on organic Expressionist forms. By the fourth instalment, it has developed into an angular Constructivist formalism that utilises the…

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  The Music Box 1932

  ★★★★ Watched by Alan Newnham 20 May 2022

  “I leave Laurel and Hardy at the foot of the stairway! One always finds one's burden again. But Laurel and Hardy teaches the higher fidelity that negates the gods and raises pianos. He, too, concludes that all is well. This universe henceforth without a master seems to him neither sterile nor futile. Each atom of that piano, each musical note of that tune-filled piano, in itself forms a world. The struggle itself toward the heights is enough to fill a man's heart. One must imagine Laurel and Hardy happy.”

  - Albert Camus, The Myth of Laurel and Hardy

Popular reviews

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  Heartworn Highways 1976

  ★★★½ Watched by Alan Newnham 26 Dec 2017 1

  If the scene of Townes playing Waitin Around to Die whilst Uncle Seymour tears up in the background doesn't rip your heart to shreds, then I'm not sure what will.

  Honest to god, in my opinion, that scene might be one of the most important moments of music caught on film.

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  Yi Yi 2000

  ★★★★★ Watched by Alan Newnham 14 Dec 2017 2

  I'm sure we all know the feeling of discovering something or someone and only wishing you'd discovered them far earlier. This is how I feel about Edward Yang after watching my first film of his, which happens to be his final film.

  Everything, from the pure poetry of the use of reflections in glass - showing us what is behind and in front, to the subtle and incredibly real feeling characters. Edward Yang has captured life at almost every angle.…