-
-
-
Far from Heaven 2002
Every moment in this film is beautiful, and it's so tightly controlled that it's suffocating. Todd Haynes stylizes every shot within an inch of its life in a flagrant show of bravura, down to the smallest details of the lighting and costuming. When Cathy breaks it off with Raymond, Julianne Moore is wrapped in a coat that perfectly blends in with the stone building, matching its color and texture. When shot from behind, she becomes just a floating pink headscarf.…
-
Poison 1991
Obviously this is a beautiful love letter to Genet, but Poison feels very much like a descendant of Rimbaud's verse as well. The links between the three stories are mostly subtextual, but Haynes intertwines therm to find poetry in their juxtapositions. He has his eye keenly focused on simultaneity in the brutality, the passion, and the obscenity of queer lives.
-
Straight and Narrow 1970
Based on my careful linear extrapolation, I'll see this another 5 times by the end of the year. It makes sense, because it fits nicely into a program as TE FIKR (or The Flicker for Those Who Don't Have the Time).
The first time I saw Straight and Narrow, I only remembered it as a silent film. It's a real shame since the soundtrack is such a good fit. The piano vamps along, looping over and over as one section's…
-
Film Feedback 1974
I was expecting some kind of dry, tedious structural hijinks from Conrad's description. Turns out it's actually a hilarious and slightly cruel film, one that takes pleasure in thwarting my instinctive attempt to find an image anywhere in the frame. I should've known.
You can tell Sharits must have loved this, because Episodic Generation follows basically the same path.
-
Bad Education 2004
Bad Education wasn't my first Almodóvar (Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown), nor is it my favorite (All About My Mother, on a good day). But it remains his most representative work for me. It's laid out what he's doing as a director and guided me in how to approach drama.
I love the fragile web of bold melodramatic strokes, where narratives reinvent themselves and pulpy afterthoughts circle back. This time more of the references became apparent, particularly the noir influences. The defining image has to be that intricate collage of torn movie posters and campaign flyers. The ass shots never hurt though.