Hash was all we could get in the late 80's in Germany. I had to go to Amsterdam for greens. I'd usually hit the Bulldog. It was amazing to see a full weed menu with a "Sensimillia of the Day" section back then. I have yet to set foot in a dispensary around here though. lol

It's probably better than you expect. Have you seen any other Pasolini? Maybe wet your feet with Oedipus Rex to see if you like his style enough to get something out of Salo.

This was more or less the reception of Sade throughout the 19th century: people read bits and pieces here and there (little was widely available), giggling at the obscenity and not daring to take him seriously. All this changed in the 20th century, first with the Surrealists and then, more significantly, after WW2, when he became an icon for an era of French modernists, including Bataille, Blanchot, Klossowski, Lacan, Barthes, Foucault, Deleuze, Sollers. For them it was not so much about the obscenity and the libertinage as about the terrifying inner logic of his texts, the challenge he poses to Enlightenment humanism by "telling it like it is" about the violent power struggles undergirding all social relations.

Salo is a peculiar chapter in that history. It's a return to Adorno's "Sade as a harbinger of 20th century fascism" thesis and as such it's not a particularly interesting reading of the Sadean text imo. BUT it also happens to be a remarkable film in its own right and it will always have the poignant resonance of being the last film Pasolini completed before his horrifying murder by Italian fascists.

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Bad Luck Banging or Loony Porn - Radu June (Romania, 2021)

Won the Golden bear in Berlin last year, provocative in the sense that it shows uncensored sex, and also confronts what I think are a bunch of taboos for Romanian society, sex, the military past, the Church etc. It blends humour and drama, although I'm not sure how well the humour translates to western audiences. I thought the first part was quite interesting as it spends some time showing the every day life in Bucharest and how slowly the West is crawling its way into the East. The second part is quite dense and philosophical, and the third for me was the weakest as is devolves into a kind of silly high-school play. Overall an interesting experience but not something I'd go back to.

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A Place in the Sun - George Stevens (1951)

It's always great to discover some classic gems. This may be a familiar movie to a lot of people but it went under my radar until now. Apparently it was a huge hit at the time, and I can see why. Very engaging, very emotional, real and relatable. I have to say that I didn't really pay attention so much to Montgomery Clift as an actor so I had no idea he was one of the original method actors. His performance is on another level. Elisabeth Taylor is pretty good too. And of course, Shelley Winters is devastating in her role. What is also surprising is how good the direction is. Stevens' name isn't really familiar to me but he has directed some pretty familiar films, like Swing time, Shane and Giant. Lovely surprise.

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All That Heaven Allows - Douglas Sirk (1955)

Some similarities with APITS (closeted main actors, dealing with social taboos) but very different experiences. The most obvious being the talent level of the actors which is nowhere near that of APITS. Everything is prim and proper, cookie-cutter, unrealistic, fake. The acting is theatrical, the direction standard and dull. The only thing that saves it is the topic it tackles (a widow falling in love with a slightly younger man outside of her class, gasp!) but even in that it's too didactic and obvious (although I guess it makes sense for the time it was made).

^ Montgomery Clift was an amazing actor - so vulnerable, natural and charismatic. A Place In The Sun is his finest performance, imho.

Saw Spencer last night and was taken aback by how borderline-ridiculous it was. Beautiful cinematography alone does not a great movie make. Stewart's performance was flat and wooden, sorry to say (and I usually quite like her) - I'm really surprised by the Oscar buzz surrounding her portrayal.

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Whenever someone mentions Montgomery Clift I think of The Right Profile, which is probably my favourite Clash song

That's MONTGOMERY CLIFT, Marie honey. :)

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Dial M for Murder - Alfred Hitchcock (1954)

Very clever and loads of fun (although obviously not a comedy). Based on a play and filmed mostly in one room so I think the original writers should get most of the kudos. Grace Kelly isn't much of an actress but she is pretty to look at. The beginning is a little too fast and confusing but thankfully you can rewind to catch up. Once the ball starts rolling it's very compelling. And the ending is very satisfying although just a touch unrealistic.

Fellini's Amarcord (1973) - Fantastic, as good as it gets

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A Hitch flick I haven't seen. Thanks. Free on PLEX

:laughing: Though I never really got Fellini.

I'll check this one out. Criterion Channel, I presume.

Always thought I was more of an Antonioni guy myself, but saw Roma in a theater a few months ago and was blown away by how sharp and funny and original it was. This one is a pretty similar film, every bit as funny and brilliant. I torrented it, right now I don't have to worry about the provider turning off my internet cause of that, I'm temporarily in a safe zone for illegal downloads so I don't have to subscribe to any streaming services.

Wow, I didn't know someone somewhere is actually getting into trouble for torrenting. Do vpns help?

Btw how do they understand you're torrenting and not streaming? The amount of data should be the same.

They don't. Especially if you watch torrents on movie sites like Sflix. That particular one is my backup when I can't find what I want on the myriad streaming sites I frequent. Streaming/ownership rights have forced most of the legit sites to stream the same content anyway, which reminds me -

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one flew over the cuckoo's nest (1975, milos forman)

Legit free streamer on tubi. Haven't seen it since... the 70s. :)

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A hero - Asghar Farhadi (2021)

Another masterpiece from the director of A separation (for which he won an Oscar). Should be subtitled The road to hell is paved with good intentions. 2h of anguish as good but not great people try to wrangle the system and catch a break.

Claudine, starring Diahann Carroll and James Earl Jones. Been listening to the soundtrack lately, which piqued my interest in the film. Such a bittersweet movie with really endearing performances by Carroll and Jones. I was pleased to learn it's in The Criterion Collection.

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Queued. Thanks.

People do get in trouble for torrenting in Canada/US. I was a very prolific piratebay user for years in Canada but nothing happened probably because I was downloading relatively esoteric or at least foreign stuff, not something Disney or whoever might have any stake in. But later when a neighbor in NYC showed me the letter he got for downloading a new season of Rick and Morty (first strike out of three), I got spooked and stopped.

VPN is too advanced for me, and since it isn't free, doesn't it defeat the purpose?

Couldn't say what's the difference between streaming and torrenting, I go to streaming sites mostly to watch soccer.

I got an email once but the general consensus I see online is that whatever company contacts your ISP provider, who does not disclose your identity to that company, and it's the ISP provider who then sends you something threatening but will just throttle your connection if they're contacted again by a company. So you're probably still safe legally unless you're doing something more than just stealing Beauty and the Beast for your own personal use.

A vpn is maybe 50 euros per year I think, so the amount of stuff you can download with it is still very much worth it. Also, I'm no tech expert, it's just a program you download, install and run.

I stopped downloading music since most of the things I listen to is available on spotify but movies and TV shows I still torrent. But I live in the outback of the world so...not really concerned about legal action.

there are free vpns guys. sometimes that means they're no good but there are some decent ones

The Man certainly didn't seem to mind when I downloaded Cocteau's 1946 film of that name!

But overall better safe than sorry. Wasn't there some story about a kid who had his life ruined because he downloaded a Nirvana song off Napster?

It also depends on where you are, what's your living situation etc. The guy who downloaded a new season of Rick and Morty was living in subsidized housing provided to postdocs and was understandably freaked out by the possibility of being penalized by the institution that hosted him cause who knows what the rules are.

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ronin (1998, john frankenheimer)

Plot is convoluted and utterly pointless but the chase scenes are so textbook good they're almost comic. Reinstated Frankenheimer to the director A list after years of absence. But it's gorgeous fluff.

Some "international movie" oscar noms:

Drive my car - Ryusuke Hamaguchi (2021) (Japan)

To me it seemed like a not very well acted and trite movie masquerading as something more profound by taking things real slow (3h runtime) and connecting itself to Chekhov. Hidetoshi Nishijima is certainly very pleasant to look at, even if he has trouble emoting. 6/10

The Worst Person in the World - Joachim Trier (2021) (Norway)

It's a movie about a woman who doesn't know what she wants that ends with her not knowing what she wants. In the meantime she fights for her right not to know what she wants and strings along a few people while doing it (hence the title). It's like spending 2h in conversation with someone who is not on the same wavelength with you. There's lots of thoughts and emotions which should have an impact if you relate to the characters, which I didn't. 6.5/10

Flee - Jonas Poher Rasmussen (2021) (Denmark)

I think this is the first movie I've seen which addresses what the refugee experience is like. It's devastating (but thankfully has a happy ending). 8.5/10

Licorice pizza - Paul Thomas Anderson (2021)

Another Oscar contender that I don't get. Headed by two ok actors who were cast mostly because they're famous people (Haim because she's a part of Haim and Hoffman because he's the son of Phillip Seymour) and featuring a host of pointless and graceless famous cameos, it also features some offensive stereotypes (as kinda explained by Anderson, because that's how people were in those days!). Also, it's a love story between a grown woman and an underage boy, which is not only weird but illegal. But aside from that, nice costumes and music. 6/10.

You should watch Red Rocket.

Last one I saw was There Will be Blood. It was my third or fourth time viewing.

Most actors are cast because they're famous people.

Actors. You're thinking of actors acting in a movie.

You mean the ignorant white guy talking to his Japanese wife who was viewed by the characters of the film as a racist moron? Here's some other movies with racist characters...

American History X
Django Unchained
Roots
12 Years a Slave
Guess Who's Coming to Dinner
In the Heat of the Night
Gran Torino
White Men Can't Jump
Do the Right Thing

I'll agree it was definitely a bit weird at the end. I didn't like the ending, actually. To be fair, she spent the entire movie repelling his advances.

Nope, most actors are cast because they're good at what they do. Which is acting.

I dunno, what was the point in casting Maya Rudolph in a 1 minute scene, that couldn't have been done by someone not famous? Same for all the other famous cameos. Except for maybe demonstrating what a cool guy Anderson is, so much so that super famous people are willing to act in two bit roles in his movies.

Actually the characters didn't find him a racist moron, the most they did was express confusion. Another problem scene is the inclusion of the only gay character as a walking stereotype. I suppose there are ways to interpret their inclusion as realistic to the portrayals of the era. It doesn't help them be any less jarring or uncomfortable for those who are the supposed target of the joke/non-joke.

Although I'm totally not surprised that once again you don't get it... ;)

P.s. Just read that Maya Rudolph is his partner, lol. The comment stands for the rest though.

If that's your takeaway from the film then you probably shouldn't be pointing fingers about not getting it.

Addidasss supports nepotism but not celebrity cameos apparently.

Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance) - There were a few scenes where the long tracking shots really worked, but they're too infrequent to justify that as anything other than a gimmick. I enjoyed it but it felt very tryhard in ways that didn't seem like they were trying to make a statement about the industries it's satirizing (particularly the humour). It definitely has the makings of a masterpiece but is held back by these things, leaving us with just a pretty good movie. I don't think Inarritu has it in him tbh (haven't seen Babel yet though, could be an exception). On the upside, it helped me recognize how excellent Symbiopsychotaxiplasm is.

Inauguration of the Pleasure Dome - A Thelemic parable of man, gods, and all that **** all drenched in gorgeous surreal lighting and colours. Prettier than Lucifer Rising.

River of Fundament - This is:
An epic
An opera
A satire
A book adaptation
A concert film
A procedural
Extreme
Surreal
Pornographic
A documentary

Three acts with a cast of around 1000 characters wherein writer Norman Mailer reincarnates three times into realities heavily inspired by his writings...and shit. There's a lot of shit. A man wraps a turd in gold, a transam gives birth to an engine, Milford Graves jams on a cow corpse in a sewer, someone gives birth to a bird, with each of the three acts being based on free improvisation performances that make heavy use of realistic space. One of the best films I've ever seen, highly recommended to anyone with an interest in experimental music or film who can stomach depravity (you will never be ready, might as well just jump right into the shit river).



Memoria - While visiting her sick sister in Colombia, Tilda Swinton is haunted by a recurring boom that only she appears to hear in this beautiful meditation on memory, colonialism, stolen trauma, perception, and isolation. Apichatpong's films always has intense sound design, but this movie seemed especially interested in directing your focus to the sound. Very lucky to have seen this in theatres, the whole scene at the farm is up there with Uncle Boonmee's cave scene and the Tropical Malady tiger confrontation as one of Apichatpong's best scenes. Going to try to catch it again while it's still on a theatre run.

And while I'm here, I'm pretty hyped for the Janus restoration of Inland Empire. They'll be showing that in theatres and you know I'm catching that bitch.

I love Birdman. It's a definite masterpiece to my mind. Perhaps my favorite movie of the 2010s.

You're so f*cking rule based, it hurts my brain. Rules. Rules. Rules. Can't use cameos. Can't use famous actors sons for lead roles. Can't use a clearly racist character in a funny way because that means you're racist. Can't have a gay character be stereotypical. Can't pay for Tom Waits to be on set for a day. That character exists in the story for one scene...but your rules say the actor can't be TOO famous. Famous people need as much screentime as possible, right?

How can you watch so many movies yet are so confused and offended by the most basic of casting concepts?

I'm not rules based at all dude, I'm just telling you how I react to these kinds of things. For me the overuse of familiar faces in films can sometimes have an adverse effect. Casting famous screen grabbers in roles which aren't written very well and therefore rely almost entirely on the magnetism of the actors may not work. It certainly didn't for me this time. I think it would've been a (slightly) better film if better actors were employed in lead roles and random acting superstars weren't cast in underwritten side-roles. I prefer unfamiliar faces and better written roles. That's all.

And I also won't get further into the discussion about the use of racist/stereotypical characters here, there has been plenty of things written about that online, but given how the discussion went on the trans issue with Chapelle, I just think it's a bit of a waste of time. ;)

To paraphrase the legendary wide receiver and all round blowhard Keyshawn Johnson:

Just give me the ball and watch the damn movie! :D

Adidasss apparently hates when racism is negatively portrayed.

Very nice of you to stick me in a box like that.

I mean, whenever I see a rape happen in a film, I just can't get over the fact that the director would include such an offensive character in a film.

A Field in England

A psychedelic folk horror flick set during the English Civil Wars. I'll leave it to others to decide whether Ben Wheatley is good enough to pull off his very ambitious designs and just say that I enjoyed most of it. Maybe upon rewatch will get the third act too.

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