1980s List Discussion and Suggestions (Lists Project Vol. 2)

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backstreetsbackalright · #26 Post by **backstreetsbackalright** » Sat May 31, 2008 2:46 pm

I heartily recommend Harun Farocki's Images of the World and the Inscription of War, which you can watch here.

Gropius · #27 Post by **Gropius** » Sat May 31, 2008 3:02 pm

The 80s feel like a bit of a wasteland as far as DVD goes, at least beyond the big budget American titles and more obvious European ones. Much of the more interesting stuff (e.g. Kiarostami, Yang, Ruiz, etc. - although I'm speculating here, as I've seen little of it) is yet to be recovered from the cracks, and it's unlikely to reappear in R1/R2 before the December deadline.

Peter Greenaway will figure highly in my list, in any case.

tavernier · #28 Post by **tavernier** » Sat May 31, 2008 3:14 pm

domino harvey wrote:I suspect that the 80s list, more than any other list, will be dominated by American films

My preliminary list of 105 films only has 24 American.

tojoed · #29 Post by **tojoed** » Sat May 31, 2008 5:23 pm

FSimeoni wrote:
tojoed wrote:It would be a sorry list for me without Diner and Atlantic City. I hope there are others here who feel the same way.
Agreed on Diner, though haven't seen Atlantic City.

There's a good Region 1 disc of Atlantic City. It should be seen, not necessarily in an auteurist sense, but as an opportunity to see the work of that very funny playwright, John Guare. Some of his lines have the habit of creeping up on you much later, and seem even funnier. See it any chance you get.

Lemmy Caution · #30 Post by **Lemmy Caution** » Sat May 31, 2008 6:08 pm

Red Sorghum - Zhang Yimou

#31 Post by **domino harvey** » Tue Jun 03, 2008 3:57 pm

I don't want to get my heart broken again, so I'm politely asking everyone participating in this list to please see my number-one lock, They All Laughed. For anyone willing to at least give the movie a shot, tell me your presumed number one choice and I will exchange the favor of making sure it gets a viewing.

denti alligator · #32 Post by **denti alligator** » Tue Jun 03, 2008 4:00 pm

domino harvey wrote:I don't want to get my heart broken again, so I'm politely asking everyone participating in this list to please see my number-one lock, They All Laughed. For anyone willing to at least give the movie a shot, tell me your presumed number one choice and I will exchange the favor of making sure it gets a viewing.

Deal! But you've gotta watch all 7 1/2 hours of Near Death.

Michael · #33 Post by **Michael** » Tue Jun 03, 2008 4:08 pm

domino harvey wrote:I don't want to get my heart broken again, so I'm politely asking everyone participating in this list to please see my number-one lock, They All Laughed. For anyone willing to at least give the movie a shot, tell me your presumed number one choice and I will exchange the favor of making sure it gets a viewing.

#1 for me is Mala Noche. Vagabond comes next.

Tom Hagen · #34 Post by **Tom Hagen** » Tue Jun 03, 2008 5:13 pm

domino harvey wrote:I don't want to get my heart broken again, so I'm politely asking everyone participating in this list to please see my number-one lock, They All Laughed. For anyone willing to at least give the movie a shot, tell me your presumed number one choice and I will exchange the favor of making sure it gets a viewing.

Thanks for the suggestion; I need to brush up on my Bogdanovich anyway. I would take you up on the quid pro quo, but I assume that you are already familiar with Raging Bull and Fanny and Alexander, my likely top two picks.

I will put in a special plea for The Right Stuff, a film that will likely make my top ten list, yet which seems largely underappreciated.

tojoed · #35 Post by **tojoed** » Tue Jun 03, 2008 6:09 pm

domino harvey wrote:I don't want to get my heart broken again, so I'm politely asking everyone participating in this list to please see my number-one lock, They All Laughed. For anyone willing to at least give the movie a shot, tell me your presumed number one choice and I will exchange the favor of making sure it gets a viewing.

Ok. My #1 is Brian de Palma's Blow Out. Are you going to start a thread for They All Laughed so we can post our thoughts on it?

#36 Post by **domino harvey** » Tue Jun 03, 2008 6:13 pm

There's one here for the DVD release, maybe we could get a mod to move that thread to the Old Films section of the forum and use it to discuss the film? Or I guess you could discuss here. On a plane or on a train I would discuss it anywhere

I've added those films mentioned in response to my proposal that I haven't seen yet to my queue except for the Wiseman, because I'm not sure if the alligator is joking or not. If he's not I'll be happy to request it via ILL.

I will continue to honor my challenge to anyone else who reads this, agrees to see the flick, and posts in this thread their number one pick-- so just post in this thread or the They All Laughed thread to let me know.

tojoed · #37 Post by **tojoed** » Tue Jun 03, 2008 6:38 pm

Tom Hagen wrote: I will put in a special plea for The Right Stuff, a film that will likely make my top ten list, yet which seems largely underappreciated.

Right with you there, Tom. It's definitely in mine.

#38 Post by **zedz** » Tue Jun 03, 2008 6:50 pm

domino harvey wrote:I don't want to get my heart broken again, so I'm politely asking everyone participating in this list to please see my number-one lock, They All Laughed. For anyone willing to at least give the movie a shot, tell me your presumed number one choice and I will exchange the favor of making sure it gets a viewing.

I like this approach: Cinephilia - Extreme! I haven't done a preliminary sort yet, but my suspected number one is AWOL on DVD, so I'll get back to you with my pick, and start looking for They All Laughed. I was surprised by the wide support for Bogdanovich in the 70s vote, so he clearly deserves more attention than I've given him in the past.

Also not on (subbed) DVD, but I love it, is Ruiz's City of Pirates, and given your liking of Hypothesis and Suspended Vocation you may want to track down the French disc if you're brave. Three Crowns of a Sailor is available subbed (and in r1, I think) and is pretty great - Orson Welles falls asleep and dreams up a lost Resnais film, or vice versa, with Sacha Vierney at his most bargain-basement inventive.

sidehacker · #39 Post by **sidehacker** » Tue Jun 03, 2008 7:32 pm

domino's idea is smart. We should all do that. My #1 is either The Beekeeper or Dust in the Wind so I suppose you can pick from one of those. I'll make this "deal" with anybody else who would like to do so.

SoyCuba · #40 Post by **SoyCuba** » Wed Jun 04, 2008 12:54 am

Ok, I'm going to take domino's challenge as well. My number one pick at least at the moment is Come and See followed by Santa sangre.

#41 Post by **zedz** » Wed Jun 04, 2008 1:09 am

I hope domino's going to start a "Me and My Big Mouth" thread where he reports back on all of these films he's rashly undertaken to watch.

I don't think denti was kidding about the Wiseman, but no fair claiming all your lists are topped by extremely long films. I think Berlin Alexanderplatz topped mine last time (honest!), but I suspect that's changed now. (Hmm, maybe I need to revisit Heimat. . .)

denti alligator · #42 Post by **denti alligator** » Wed Jun 04, 2008 1:25 am

zedz wrote:I don't think denti was kidding about the Wiseman

I wasn't. This will be my no. 1. I don't see how any film from the decade could displace it.

And I hope domino isn't the only one who watches it. It's really a remarkable work.

yoshimori · #43 Post by **yoshimori** » Wed Jun 04, 2008 2:14 am

By coincidence - since it arrived yesterday - I just finished re-watching Near Death, which, btw, is only 6 hours long on Wiseman's 3 disc set. It's a masterpiece of thought-provocation, especially if you're just old enough to begin to feel the deterioration of your body's functions. I find the main doctor a bit too glib, too falsely "concerned", but the case studies are horrifyingly rivetting. Probably my favorite film of 1989.

If I were to play domino's game, I'd ask people to watch Morita's Sorekara, which is even better, funnier, more beautiful, than his better known and justly loved Family Game. Unfortunately, the HK dvd of Sorekara is a total abomination and should be avoided at all costs as it will ruin the film. The r2jp is beautiful, but unsubbed. [And while on topic of Japanese films, Itami (who plays the father in Family Game) made a hilarious film with his wife, A Taxing Woman, for which there is a lame r1 dvd. The r2jp here is MUCH superior, and has English subs.]

For me, the lost film of this decade is Wajda's The Possessed, which I saw as a young'n at the LA AFI Fest in like 1990 and have found no trace of since. I remember a mesmerizingly cold and bizarrely funny film.

Also likely to be orphaned, but recommended if you can find them, Gherman's My Friend Ivan Lapshin and Chen's King of the Children.

Steven H · #44 Post by **Steven H** » Wed Jun 04, 2008 10:59 am

yoshimori wrote:If I were to play domino's game, I'd ask people to watch Morita's Sorekara, which is even better, funnier, more beautiful, than his better known and justly loved Family Game. Unfortunately, the HK dvd of Sorekara is a total abomination and should be avoided at all costs as it will ruin the film. The r2jp is beautiful, but unsubbed.

I couldn't agree more about Sorekara, and the HK DVD is pretty awful (though watchable.) Glad you brought up Itami, though something about Taxing Woman rubbed me the wrong way. I loved The Funeral though.

Some other great Japanese films from this decade (that are going to make my list) are two out in three of Suzuki Seijun's Taisho Trilogy with the first, Zigeunerweisen, probably itching for my second place slot, and Kagaro-Za not too far behind. These films are strange, head scratching, ghost films, and Zigeunerweisen comes in the grand (in my opinion) tradition of gorgeous full-frame color Japanese presentation from the ATG (and I'll go ahead and say this is my "if you watching one film" film, as I place They All Laughed on my netflix queue). These films are also *radically* different from the earlier Suzuki films, and I would say where those are "camp" these are mysterious. Yoshida's Wuthering Heights, Imamura's Ballad of Narayama, Yanagimachi's Fire Festival, and two Terayama Shuji films, Grass Labyrinth and Farewell to the Ark, are also swimming around in my list.

Kobayashi's Tokyo Trial, while a tad politically conservative, comes close to the world of avant-documentaries that Marker does so well, and is worth watching (the Japanese DVD is cheap, and has an english audio option). I haven't completely made my mind up about this one yet.

dave41n · #45 Post by **dave41n** » Wed Jun 04, 2008 4:38 pm

Robert Gardner's Forest of Bliss will likely top my list. Gardner, an ethnographic filmmaker, explores life—and death—in Benares, India through some of the most visceral imagery I've seen on film. Survival and passing emerge as Gardner's chief concerns out of what is otherwise visual anthropology. It's an unvarnished, unsparing film and is a sharp précis on our place in this world. I highly recommend it. The DVD is included with a must-read text on the making of the film (here). The text is a conversation between Gardner and a colleague which follows the film shot by shot. I saw this on film first and later via this DVD, which is very good.

#46 Post by **zedz** » Wed Jun 04, 2008 5:05 pm

This discussion has been taking off, and I've already got a half page of recommendations to follow up on. What would people think about splitting this thread into two? The first would carry on as is, the second I can maintain as a kind of index where I'll summarise people's personal recommendations (can we limit this to ten films apiece, preferably overlooked ones? - not much point telling people that they should check out Blue Velvet).

Proposed format:

Name of recommender
Film Title 1 (Director) - DVD availability (best edition / R1 edition, plus any important notes on problems with editions, e.g. no subs, bad transfer)
Film Title 2 (Director) - DVD availability (best edition / R1 edition)
etc.

People can refer back to this discussion thread if they want to find out more about a particular film. I can either manage this by relocating recommendations from the Discussion thread, or people can post their own concise lists in that format. I just don't want to end up with two indistinguishable, or barely distinguishable threads.

Also, for those indulging in any of the viewing challenges flying about, it would be great if you reported back in this thread, even if you hated the film that was tossed back at you.

Steven H · #47 Post by **Steven H** » Wed Jun 04, 2008 5:07 pm

zedz wrote:Also, for those indulging in any of the viewing challenges flying about, it would be great if you reported back in this thread, even if you hated the film that was tossed back at you.

I would say *especially* if you hated the film! And great idea, by the way.

tojoed · #48 Post by **tojoed** » Thu Jun 05, 2008 5:24 am

Zedz, I'm all for splitting it in two. Can we post recommendations here in the meantime, or should we wait? And does it have to be ten or fewer?

#49 Post by **domino harvey** » Thu Jun 05, 2008 1:07 pm

I don't think the thread needs to be split at all, all discussion of the 80s list should go in the 80s list thread

#50 Post by **zedz** » Thu Jun 05, 2008 3:32 pm

I'll do it as a trial. Keep posting recommendations and comments here and I'll transfer them over. You can comment on / recommend as many as you like here - I was thinking of the other thread as an 'index' of the kind of 'this is my potentially overlooked number one film' posts we've been getting. It would get unmanageable if people were posting their entire shortlists, since the idea is to direct people to supposedly 'unmissable' films.

Restricting these kind of recommendations to films that are actually available on DVD somewhere in the world is also in the spirit of the enterprise. This thread can handle all the other, unavailable films, as usual.

The other option is to add these top picks to the first post in this thread, but that would be offloading the chore onto domino.