Grandma. Another one from Ebertfest, one of my least favorite of the weekend, but it’s not bad by any means. In short, a granddaughter goes to her grandmother’s house to get money for money for an abortion, and we go from there. This grandma… has anger issues. She’s gruff, flaky, independent. It’s weird having a central character who’s so angry all the time. Takes something special to keep her worth watching. She’s her own worst enemy for sure. She also drives a classic car that’s near breaking down. She doesn’t take care of it – metaphor! Themes of motherhood, parental influence, experiencing and anticipating loss, grieving, etc. All female cast except for an excellent Sam Elliott cameo and the guy at dinner.

Crimson Peak. This was the opener at Ebertfest when I went a couple months ago. I loved it the first time and it was even better with an enthusiastic crowd in an old theater. Felt like an event. The anticipation helps a lot, and having the director on hand to talk about his movie does, too. One of my favorite lines from Guillermo Del Toro’s awesome Q&A that night:

I don’t make eye candy. I make eye protein.

He shared background on the influences, comparisons and similarities to Jane Eyre and Frankenstein, which have a similar sense of loss and abandonment, and to a few Hitchcock movies – Rebecca, Suspicion, Notorious – as more recent gothic romances where love ends in conflagration. In this one the heroine’s experience of love goes hand-in-hand with the experience of death. He also talked a lot about the unity of construction through the whole thing. How the story is told in architecture (different architectural styles through the house and each floor, the differing levels of moral order and corruption), in costume (Chastain’s blue dress borrows architectural elements from the house; another draws influence from her association with moth vs. Wasikowska’s butterfly; she’s the only person to wear red, etc.), and in sets (oversized chairs when our heroine takes ill). Aside from the movie itself, I also enjoyed hearing Del Toro talk about two approaches to evaluating a movie. One, as a viewer, does it do its job? Like, did you feel like you wasted your time? And another way is to approach it as a piece of art – taking into account the context, influences, intentions – did it meet its goals?

The Witch. Feminist folk horror? I dig it.

The Da Vinci Code. I remember reading a few pages of the book when it came out, and… yeesh. This is much better. Not great at all, but elevates the source material into something amusing.

Citizenfour. There’s this interesting tension where a guy has done something earth-shaking, and he knows it… but he’s watching the effects while hidden in a hotel room far from home. Very cool to see all the planning and diligence they took to keep things mum until they were ready to reveal. So glad they took the time to document this while it was happening. I’m probably on a watchlist now.

nyctaeus:

Ad Reinhardt, from ‘How to Look at Art, Arts & Architecture’ (1946)

The Good, the Bad and the Ugly. Such a lovely mix in this movie. You’ve got one-liners, goofball slapstick, melodrama, real drama. Those mournful interludes on the Civil War battlefront hit hard this time around. :’(

Meru. I liked it most when they were showing the footage that makes you squirm and makes your palms get sweaty. Wish they’d geeked out on the nitty-gritty climbing details more, and/or cut back on the talking heads. Sometimes the people who were there aren’t the best ones to tell the story?

Gone Girl. Third viewing. Filed under: Gone Girl.

Tangerine. It kicks your feet out from under you with all this zany energy. I wish it could have sustained it all the way through. The scene at the end where all the threads come together is a bit of a too-long jumble. And some parts are, ah, problematic because the tone feels a bit off. But man, such a fresh and fiery start. I love how they work in the soundtrack, and let the visuals and the music guide you every now and then.

The Assassin. Not going to pretend that I understood the plot in its finest details, but it’s pretty great. We have a heroine who’s had her life planned for her, and now she is wrestling with a choice. Love how the soundtrack often sticks to almost silence, except for a slow drum strike every few seconds. There’s one long scene that’s we watch – just barely, sometimes – through these gauzy curtains that drift back and forth as the camera pans from A to B and back. It’s one of those moments that gets me fired up about what you can do with movies with a little patience. Rare to see something so reflective yet so lively.