41 Comments


  1. Rick Vance says:
    October 31, 2012 at 1:25 pm

    That homework question was close to stumping me. It is a lot harder to find things that use English words in broken ways than it is to just find straight up made up stuff.

    Reply
  2. Jandy Hardesty says:
    October 31, 2012 at 1:41 pm

    Just for clarification, is the homework asking for invented dialects like the two mentioned, or could it be a film that uses actual dialects, like Creole or Cockney or Yorkshire dialects (or varieties of pidgin English)?

    Reply
    • Rick Vance says:
      October 31, 2012 at 1:47 pm

      They want broken English / fantasy English not spoken languages in the world today, they ruled out stuff like Miller’s Crossing and Mamet speak in the episode (I love time tracks.)

      Reply
  3. Antho42 says:
    October 31, 2012 at 2:18 pm

    Kurt, speaking of Pedro Almodovar and Halloween, when are you going to watch The Skin I Live In? I am curious to hear your thoughts.

    Reply
  4. Sean Kelly says:
    October 31, 2012 at 2:19 pm

    I haven’t yet decided whether or not I’m going to squeeze Cloud Atlas in this weekend. I’m already seeing three special screenings, including a triple bill of Romero’s Living Dead trilogy, and I don’t know if I could fit (or handle) a 3 hour sci-fi epic.

    Reply
  5. Nat Almirall says:
    October 31, 2012 at 2:21 pm

    I’m thinking Kurtis has it in for me.

    Reply
    • Kurt says:
      November 1, 2012 at 1:19 pm

      Your in my sights, Nat. (*Does Finger pointing between eyes from across the internets*)

      Reply
      • Nat Almirall says:
        November 1, 2012 at 1:55 pm

        I knew it — was it my steadfast love of capitalism or my pithy rejoinders that offended? We may have to square off on trivia one of these days.

        Anyway, you mentioned The Trojan Women on Vanessa Redgrave’s filmography, and you may want to check that out if you can. There’s not much direction-wise going on in it, but there’s some good performances. It’s a simple adaptation of Euripedes’s play (hence the lack of cinematic flair), and, much as I dislike Katharine Hepburn, she was born to play Hecuba. Even more so, it has the Mighty Brian Blessed (though his best stuff is, bar-none, Blackadder).

        And I’m glad to hear the love for that series on here every once in a while; series three is some of the best television comedy anywhere, ever. (Though The Larry Sanders Show is the best tv comedy of all time.

        Reply
        • Kurt says:
          November 1, 2012 at 3:03 pm

          Huge fan of Brian Blessed, but his best role is actually Caesar in “I, Claudius” (and guiltiest pleasure is in Flash Gordon as the leader of the winged men.)

          Reply
          • Nat Almirall says:
            November 1, 2012 at 5:13 pm

            However, he never bellows “Fresh horses!” in I, Claudius. Check and mate.

            That series is an actor’s feast though — somehow everyone’s stealing the scene from everyone else and yet there’s more left than when they began.

            Reply
  6. Sean Kelly says:
    October 31, 2012 at 5:46 pm

    If you disliked Rubber, chances are you will like Wrong even less.

    Kurt was sitting a few seats away from me and could probably vouch towards my non-reaction to the film.

    It actually made me feel quite bad hearing all these people around me laughing, with me just sitting there straight-faced.

    Reply
  7. Robert Reineke says:
    October 31, 2012 at 7:49 pm

    FWIW, The Texas Chain Saw Massacre, like Psycho and Silence of the Lambs, is inspired by Ed Gein although obviously not literally based on Wisconsin’s Plainfield Butcher.

    It also makes an awesome triple feature with Psycho and Tucker and Dale vs. Evil.

    Reply
  8. Sean Kelly says:
    October 31, 2012 at 11:36 pm

    I quite like The Innkeepers and actually rewatched it last night.

    P.S. Kurt, next time you see the film, look VERY closely at the window during the final few seconds.

    Reply
    • Kurt Halfyard says:
      November 1, 2012 at 1:00 am

      This is cool (the ghost-Paxton), although if it were up to me, the ‘door slam’ ending of INNKEEPERS would be a quiet, slow closing of the door, a shot that would echo the ‘fake’ video that is shown on Pat Healy’s “EVIL INSIDE” laptop earlier in the film . A bit more symmetry, and really resonating with the theme of the lead character working herself into a state of hysteria, but nothing really going on in the Hotel other than a very overactive imagination (and *SPOILER* a man who commits suicide at a very inconvenient time.)

      Reply
  9. Rick Vance says:
    November 1, 2012 at 6:29 am

    First I have to delve deeper into the whole killing the critic = bad thing.

    I mean unless you see yourself as the critic in question, or the person being upset as a rational member of society I don’t understand the ire, from Frank Herbert: “My son displays a general garment and you claim it’s cut to your fit?”

    Clearly the comment made by Broadbent to Tom Hanks is something to appease him because his book is terrible and lying to make him feel better is the only way out of that situation.

    Also from the filmmakers side, they are the same people who got 3 critics to do feature length commentaries of the Matrix trilogy knowing full well that the later two are not well liked by most people (AMAZING commentaries too).

    So I think your comments say more about you then about the film or what the filmmakers think of criticism.

    Reply
    • Jandy Hardesty says:
      November 1, 2012 at 10:43 am

      Agreed. I didn’t see the critic scene as a statement on criticism at all, at least not in terms of the film as a whole. The author is a boor, he wrote a bad book, and he lashes out in the way he’s accustomed to because he can’t take criticism. If anything, it’s the author that comes out poorly (although humorously, since that story is a farce), as well as the society that makes him a hero because he’s an asshole, not the critic. Also, the same thing happens in the book in the same way, and it’s even more clear that Knuckle Sandwich is a bad book, the critic was writing an honest and true review, and the author is acting out of turn – but with the satire suggesting how much our society loves a scandal, thereby making his book a success BECAUSE he acts badly. The point I got was that society is messed up because we will side, with our money at least, with a murderer instead of with a rational critic.

      Reply
      • Andrew James says:
        November 1, 2012 at 1:03 pm

        Yes but the critic in the film is played as a caricature to the Nth degree. Ridiculously snobby with a martini and a scarf. If I remember correctly they had him talking with his nose held highly and an exaggerated British accent. It was a bit much.

        Reply
  10. Rick Vance says:
    November 1, 2012 at 6:37 am

    On the movie as a whole I can’t disagree stronger that cutting the stories in order in their entirety would make the movie stronger, it would destroy all impact that film has. To me the way it is edited was one of the strongest parts of the film and if you were to do them chronologically more emphasis would be put on some over others which I think is the wrong way to look at the movie.

    The movie doesn’t have an ironic bone in its body and I think the entire thing plays into that. That each segment feels like another movie to its core is deliberate because it plays into the overall theme of how art shapes the world, the make up is dodgy as a gesture of showing that they are not trying to pull one over on the audience and the characters may be a tad flat because it is supposed to be a thing of momentum and build more than any individual thread taking prominence. The fact that the movie is so obviously playing for comedy so much of the time also plays into this because humor is disarming.

    It traffics in cinematic and visual ‘cliches’ the same way other films traffic in nostalgia for a time or a place. I can therefore totally understand why it doesn’t work on some people because the trafficking of nostalgia (say a Tree of Life) doesn’t tend to work on me.

    This movie works on that line from Who Shot Liberty Valence which kinda relates it to Argo

    “When forced to pick between truth and legend, print the legend.”

    Finally Kurt as someone who doesn’t read comics could you possibly stop using comic booky as a derogatory term against a film.

    Reply
  11. rot says:
    November 1, 2012 at 9:14 am

    I say you guys are stuck on the notes and can’t hear the music of Cloud Atlas. There is stuff there if you are able to let go of the analytic tic. Some movies are meant to be experienced (and the throwing off the building of the critic is to say as much)… this was the same thing with Avatar. It is fine if you don’t like the music, but at least accept it on those terms, not as individual notes.

    some food for thought:
    http://blogs.suntimes.com/foreignc/2012/10/a-taste-in-transcendence.html

    Reply
    • Andrew James says:
      November 1, 2012 at 1:17 pm

      I tried Rot. I did. I went in to this thing really wanting (and actually expecting) to like it. I deliberately tried to shed any analytic or “criticness” chip I might have on my shoulder and just let the film take me for a ride. Let it sweep me away. But nothing in here did that. Ever. Music is a sum of its parts and if none of those parts are working or help to better each other, than the symphony isn’t going to work either.

      Reply
  12. rot says:
    November 1, 2012 at 9:27 am

    I see Cloud Atlas as a pretty great pop song, sure it touches on these hot button issues throughout human history but they are done emblematic of some higher symphonic agenda. You may as well dissect a pop song. Pop songs are not necessarily shallow, they just resonate on a different frequency of long prose. They heighten the feelings, they depend on you hearing the whole, of allowing yourself to be caught up in it as something more then parts. Cloud Atlas is an experience first, everything else second. Even the positive deconstructions of what it means, it is just mildly amusing to me… the experience is the thing… and you either take it as that or not at all. The same with Tree of Life, Avatar, any kind of work that is clearly playing with form symphonically and as spectacle.

    Reply
    • Jandy Hardesty says:
      November 1, 2012 at 10:36 am

      It’s weird that I loved Cloud Atlas and The Tree of Life, and didn’t much care for Avatar. Its experience didn’t ring as true for me, nor stick with me in any lasting emotional way, like the other two have (so far – I’m only a week gone on Cloud Atlas).

      Reply
  13. Goon says:
    November 1, 2012 at 12:37 pm

    re: Tucker and Dale

    Andrew, Tyler is in some other movies, ie. he’s the guy who lets the first ape out of its cage at the start of Rise of the Planet of the Apes, but you may be more interested to know that Tyler got his start as Ryan Gosling’s best bud character on Breaker High. he’s still “Hungry J” to me.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YYM5MQFV6j0 (scroll to 1:50)

    Reply
  14. Sean Kelly says:
    November 1, 2012 at 4:06 pm

    I’ve been thinking how last year’s Toronto After Dark begun a chain reaction, which resulted in me becoming connected with the Toronto film blogger community (and Row Three) and how the differences (socially) between this year and last are astronomical.

    Here is a rough timeline:
    - I go to Toronto After Dark on my lonesome (for the third year) and I don’t know anybody. I’m somewhat amazed to learn that film bloggers like myself can get accredited for the festival (and they even linked to my reviews, even though I was not accredited).
    - I was already following TheSubstream on Twitter for about a year (I guessing I started following them around TIFF10), but I decided to actually visit the site for the first time to check out their TAD coverage. It was actually one of the Two Minute Critic videos, which introduced me to Kurt (and an unrelated video on the site introduced me to the MAMO guys). I also begin posting on their (now defunct) forum
    - MAMO posted the episode, in which they were critical of Toronto After Dark. Fans of the festival were encouraged via Twitter to come to the festival’s defense. That defensive post was my very first comment on Row Three and I’ve stuck around ever since (subscribing to both MAMO and, a few months later, Cinecast).
    - In November 2011, TIFF held a special “80s Tweet-Up” at the Bell Lightbox, which I attended. Many of the Toronto Film Bloggers group also showed up and sat together. The only people I recognized at that time were Matthew Price and Ryan McNeil (whom I’ve actually known since childhood, since I went to elementary school with his brother). There were also a few people in attendance who I was already following on Twitter, but didn’t before put a face to. Being a typically shy person (with Asperger’s), I never really talked to anyone (face-to-face) at that Tweet-Up (though I was following them all on Twitter by the end of the night).
    - In January, I get an e-mail from Kurt inviting me to the Toronto Film Blogger meet-up. Around the same time, I was offering my services to become a news contributor for TheSubstream (by pure coincidence, the Substream guys showed up at that first meet-up, yet I never talked to them. I started writing for the site a few days later. :P )
    - Hot Docs in May was the first film festival, in which I regularly saw members of the blogger group at screenings.
    - At TIFF I finally meet Mike Cameron of TheSubstream in person, despite me having been contributing for a few months at that point (I previously met Rajo at my second blogger meet-up, as well as Hot Docs).
    - Finally, at Toronto After Dark this year, I got myself accredited and I hung out with the Toronto Blogger folks for the bulk of the 21 screenings I attended.

    Here’s a Rough Tally of how I spent Toronto After Dark:
    Sat in “Toronto Film Blogger Row” – 15 screenings
    Sat with Friend from University – 4 screenings
    Sat Alone in Balcony, only to have Kurt sit behind me – 1 Screening
    Sat Alone – 1 Screening

    It’s definitely interesting what a difference a year makes.

    Reply
    • Kurt Halfyard says:
      November 2, 2012 at 8:41 am

      Social media tools and film festival enjoyment is indeed a synergistic combination! I cannot imagine doing TIFF ( with its scattered venues and huge amount in international friends coming to town) without Twitter anymore.

      Glad to see you join the fold, Sean.

      Reply
  15. Rick Vance says:
    November 2, 2012 at 9:33 am

    Kurt you are 2 for 2 with the 5 hour epics.

    Wasseypur is unreal.

    Reply
  16. Sean Kelly says:
    November 2, 2012 at 12:32 pm

    One more note about the Lightbox Bond screenings.

    I saw FROM RUSSIA WITH LOVE and GOLDFINGER last weekend and they were BOTH digital restorations.

    I’m not sure if that’s the case for ALL the Bond films or just the big ones.

    Reply
  17. Sean Kelly says:
    November 3, 2012 at 1:31 pm

    FYI: A Toronto After Dark Pubcast by The Liberal Dead, featuring John Allison and Kurt as guests (among others), is now up:
    http://www.blogtalkradio.com/liberaldead/2012/11/03/dead-after-dark-toronto-after-dark-2012-live-pubcast-

    I was sitting to the side and watching the recording and it was definitely entertaining watching Kurt do his thing. (EDIT: After listening to the podcast, I realized Bob Turnbull shows up as well. I had gone home by the time he hit the mic).

    BTW, if you want to hear my somewhat high pitched and very nervous-sounding voice, I appear during the first six minutes of the first pubcast:
    http://www.blogtalkradio.com/liberaldead/2012/10/24/dead-after-dark-toronto-after-dark-2012-live-pubcast-1

    Reply
  18. Kurt says:
    November 4, 2012 at 7:32 pm

    I’m not 100% sure if I was SOBER when I went up to the MICROPHONE there…listen at your peril.

    Reply

Leave a comment