January Film Club

Happy New Year everyone!  A new year means a whole new lineup of films for Film Club.  We will continue to meet on the third Thursday of each month at 6:15pm (unless otherwise indicated).  In the tradition of previous years of Film Club, I'd like to create an experience that will challenge you as a viewer.  I want to show you films that will make you think, spark up lively discussions and maybe even just entertain you.  One of the goals for this year's club, I think, will be a greater emphasis on the discussion following the film.  We have had some good talks this past year, but I'd love to amp that up a bit, and the best way to do this is with films that lend themselves naturally to discussion, so be prepared for some really stellar films this year.

Now, remember when I said Film Club meets on the third Thursday of each month (unless otherwise indicated)?  Well, that holds true, except for this month.  I will be out of town on the 16th (normal Film Club night) so I will be pushing this month's film to the following Thursday, the 23rd.

Ok, so, to kick off our exciting new year of Film Club, allow me to introduce our first film.

On Thursday, Jan. 23rd at 6:15pm we will be watching Alain Resnais' wonderful, enigmatic film:  Last Year at Marienbad.

Last Year at Marienbad is a 1961 French film directed by Alain Resnais.  The film is famous for its enigmatic narrative structure, in which truth and fiction are difficult to distinguish, and the temporal and spatial relationship of the events is open to question.  The dream-like nature of the film has fascinated and baffled audiences and critics; some hail it as a masterpiece, others find it incomprehensible.

The film takes place at a social gathering at a chateau or baroque hotel, a man approaches a woman.  He claims they met the year before at Marienbad and is convinced that she is waiting there for him.  The woman insists they have never met.  A second man, who may be the woman's husband, repeatedly asserts his dominance over the first man, including beating him several times at a mathematical game (a version of Nim).  Through ambiguous flashbacks and disorienting shifts of time and location, the film explores the relationships among the characters.  Conversations and events are repeated in several places in the chateau and grounds, and there are numerous tracking shots of the chateau's corridors, with ambiguous voice overs.  The characters are also unnamed.

The film continually creates an ambiguity in the spatial and temporal aspects of what it shows, and creates uncertainty in the mind of the spectator about the causal relationships between events.  This may be achieved through editing, giving the apparently incompatible information in consecutive shots, or within a shot which seems to show impossible juxtapositions, or by means of repetitions of events in different settings and decor.  These ambiguities are matched by contradictions in the narrator's voiceover commentary.  Among the notable images in the film is a scene in which two characters (and the camera) rush out the chateau and are faced with a tableau of figures arranged in a geometric garden; although the people cast long dramatic shadows, the trees in the garden do not.  The manner in which the film is edited challenged the established classical style of narrative construction.  It allowed the themes of time and the mind and the interaction of past and present to be explored in an original way.  As spatial and temporal continuity is destroyed by its method of filming and editing, the film offers instead a "mental continuity", a continuity of thought.

The film received mixed reviews when it was released and even continues to receive much of the same, that said, it has cemented itself as one of the great works of cinema.  It currently holds an impressive 95% on Rottentomatoes.com out of 42 critical reviews, and Roger Ebert awarded the film 4 stars and included it on his list of Great Movies.  He said of the film, "The idea, I think, is that life is like this movie:  No matter how many theories you apply to it, life presses on indifferently toward its own inscrutable ends.  The fun is in asking questions.  Answers are a form of defeat."

This is a VERY interesting film:  a mystery and a romance wrapped up inside an enigma.  I hope that you can make it out to see this wonderful film!

Here's the trailer:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yc6n2McMAnY

December Film Club

Home for the Holidays is a 1995 comedy-drama film directed by Jodie Foster.  The film stars Holly Hunter, Robert Downey Jr., Anne Bancroft, Charles Durning, Dylan McDermott, Geraldine Chaplin, Steve Guttenberg, Cynthia Stevenson, Claire Danes and David Strathairn.  Claudia Larson (Holly Hunter) is a single mom who has just been fired from her job as an art restorer due to budget cuts.  She flies to spend Thanksgiving at the home of her parents, Adele (Bancroft) and Henry Larson (Durning), while her only child Kitt (Danes) decides to stay home and spend the holiday with her boyfriend.  The family gathering also includes Claudia's resentful, conservative sister, Joanne Larson Wedman (Stevenson), her stuffy banker brother-in-law Walter (Guttenberg) and their two spoiled children.  Also there is Claudia's gay brother Tommy (Robert Downey Jr.) and his new friend Leo Fish (Dylan McDermott), along with their eccentric Aunt Glady (Chaplin).

Roger Ebert awarded the film 3 1/2 stars and praised Foster's ability to direct "the film with a sure eye for the revealing little natural moment," and Downey's performance that "brings out all the complexities of a character who has used a quick wit to keep the world's hurts at arm's length."

The film is set during Thanksgiving, but since that holiday has just passed and Christmas is on its way, it felt appropriate.  Film Club will be meeting Thursday, Dec. 19th at 6:15pm.  Come on out and join us!

Here's the trailer: 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qjZ622X30_U

November Film Club

Hey everyone, guess what?  It's November!  Time for another film!

First, I'd like to thank everyone who was able to make it out to our Halloween Horror Fest, we had a great turnout, and it was a lot of fun, so once more, thank you.

For the month of November we will be returning to our normal Film Club structure, meeting for a film on the third Thursday at 6:15pm.  We will be meeting Nov. 21st (the week before Thanksgiving), and we will be watching Joel and Ethan Coen's masterpiece of a film:  No Country for Old Men.

No Country for Old Men is a 2007 American neo-Western thriller directed, written, and edited by Joel and Ethan Coen, based on the Cormac McCarthy novel of the same name.  The film stars Tommy Lee Jones, Javier Bardem and Josh Brolin and tells the story of an ordinary man to who chance delivers a fortune that is not his, and the ensuing cat-and-mouse drama as three men crisscross each other's paths in the desert landscape of 1980 West Texas.  Themes of fate, conscience and circumstance re-emerge that the Coen brothers have previously explored in Blood Simple and Fargo.

Among its four Oscars at the 2007 Academy Awards were awards for Best Picture, Best Director, and Best Adapted Screenplay, allowing the Coen brothers to join the five previous directors honored three times for a single film.  The film holds an impressive 94% "Certified Fresh" rating on the aggregate review site, Rottentomatoes.com out of 232 critical reviews.

The late Roger Ebert said of the film, "No Country for Old Men is as good a film as the Coen brothers, Joel and Ethan, have ever made, and they made Fargo. Many of the scenes in No Country for Old Men are so flawlessly constructed that you want them to simply continue, and yet they create an emotional suction drawing you to the next scene.  Another movie that made me feel that way was Fargo.  To make one such film is a miracle.  Here is another."

This is one of my all-time favorite films of the last decade, if not ever.  I hope that you will join us for our viewing and discussion of this remarkable film.  Again, we will be meeting Nov. 21st at 6:15pm.  Hope to see you there!

Here's the trailer:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cED2AKWxWJc

October Horror Fest

Hey folks, thanks to everyone who was able to make it out to see Melancholia last month, hope you enjoyed it!

For the month of October we will be having our annual Horror Fest.  This year, though, I've decided to mix it up a bit and instead of having a film each week, we will be having a horror film marathon, split between two days.  The first two films will be on Wednesday, Oct. 30th starting at 5pm and 7pm and the second two films will be on Halloween, Oct. 31st. also starting at 5pm and 7pm.  Try to be there as close as possible to the starting point of the films so we can get started right away.

The other significant change to Horror Fest this year, is that instead of mainly classic horror films, I've decided to show a few newer horror films that do a decent job of delivering the scares.

Here's what the lineup looks like:
(click the title to view the trailer)


Wednesday, Oct. 30th at 5:00pm:
Insidious




















Wednesday Oct. 30th at 7:00pm:
The Conjuring




















Thursday, Oct. 31st at 5:00pm:
Sinister




















Thursday, Oct. 31st at 7:00pm:
Evil Dead




















Alright you guys, I hope you're ready for a couple nights of horror filled fun.  If you aren't able to make it or if horror isn't your bag, that's ok, we look forward to seeing you at a later (non-horror) film club!

September Film Club

Thank you to everyone who was able to make it out for the documentaries this summer, we will now be returning to the original Film Club schedule of every third Thursday of the month at 6:15pm (unless otherwise specified).  For the month of September we will be watching the beautiful, moving, elegiac film by Lars Von Trier, Melancholia.

Melancholia is an apocalyptic drama written and directed by Lars Von Trier, starring Kirsten Dunst, Charlotte Gainsbourg, Alexander Skarsgård, and Kiefer Sutherland.  The narrative revolves around two sisters during and shortly after one's wedding, while Earth is about to collide with an approaching rogue planet.  The film prominently features music from the prelude to Richard Wagner's opera Tristan und Isolde.  The film begins with an introductory sequence involving the main characters and images from space and introducing many of the film's leitmotifs.  The film continues in two parts.  Part One:  "Justine" and Part Two: "Claire".  The first scene explores the events at the wedding reception, and the second part follows the sisters' lives after the reception.  Most of the film takes place at the home of Claire (played by Charlotte Gainsbourg) and John (Kiefer Sutherland), Justine's (Kirsten Dunst) sister and brother-in-law.  The events in the second part lead up to the resolution of what is happening with the rogue planet, nicknamed "Melancholia".

This is probably the most commercial, polished film the director (Lars Von Trier) has every released.  He and another filmmaker were the pioneers of the Dogme 95 Manifesto (click link for more info) that rejected the polished look of modern films, favoring the more realistic, gritty look they limited themselves to.  While the films of the Dogme directors are very fine films that explored a more "bare-bones" style of film making, this film (Melancholia) is one of Von Trier's greatest triumphs.

The film has received mostly positive reviews; it maintains a 77% "Fresh" rating on Rotten Tomatoes, with the consensus: "Melancholia's dramatic tricks are more obvious than they should be, but this is otherwise a showcase for Dunst's acting and for Lars Von Trier's profound, visceral vision of depression and destruction."

Roger Ebert awarded the film 3 1/2 out of 4 stars, saying of the film, "If I were choosing a director to make a film about the end of the world, Von Trier the gloomy Dane might be my first choice.  The only other name that comes to mind is Werner Herzog's.  Both understand that at such a time silly little romantic subplots take on a vast irrelevance.  In the cast of Von Trier's characters, impending doom seems to have created a mental state of dazed detachment.  They continue to act as if their personal concerns have the slightest relevance.  Von Trier has never made a more realistic domestic drama, depicting a family that is dysfunctional not in crazy ways but in ways showing a defiant streak of intelligent individualism."

We will be watching Melancholia on Thursday, September 19th at 6:15pm.  Hope to see you there!

Here's the trailer:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wzD0U841LRM

August Film Club: Documentary # 2

Alright everyone, thanks to those were able to make it to the last film.

For our second August documentary and also our final film of the summer documentary Series, we will be watching another film by acclaimed director Werner Herzog, and that film is the fascinating and compelling Grizzly Man.

The film is about Timothy Treadwell who spent 13 summers in Katmai National Park and Preserve, Alaska, living with bears.  Over time, he believed the bears trusted him and would allow him to approach them; sometimes he would even touch them.  Treadwell filmed his exploits, and used the films to raise public awareness of the problems faced by bears in North America.  In 2003, at the end of his 13th visit, he and his girlfriend Amie Huguenard were attacked, killed and partially eat by a bear; the events which led to the attack are unknown.

For Grizzly Man, Herzog used sequences extracted from more than 100 hours of video footage shot by Treadwell during his last five years of his life, and conducted interviews with Treadwell's family and friends, as well as bear and nature experts.  Park rangers and bear experts give counterpoints to statements and actions by Treadwell, such as his repeated claims that he is defending the bears from poachers.  Park rangers point out that while the bears may be subject to habitat loss and climate change, etc. there was never a recorded incident of poaching at this national park.  Treadwell had also convinced himself that he had gained the trust of certain bears, enough to walk up and pet them like dogs.  Park rangers again point out that bears are still wild and potentially dangerous animals, and that it was amazing that Treadwell survived as many years as he did without being mauled.  One park ranger is so astonished by Treadwell's actions that he thinks the bears themselves were so confused by Treadwell's direct casual contact that they weren't quite sure how to react at first.

Herzog also narrates, and offers his own interpretations of the events.  In his narration, he depicts Treadwell as a disturbed man who many have had a death wish toward the end of his life, but does not condemn him for this.

Upon its North American theatrical release, Grizzly Man received almost universal acclaim amongst critics.  The film has a score of 93% on Rotten Tomatoes.  David Denby of The New Yorker said, "Narrating in his extraordinary German-accented English, Herzog is fair-minded and properly respectful of Treadwell's manic self-invention.  He even praises Treadwell as a good filmmaker:  as Treadwell stands talking in the foreground of the frame, the bears play behind him or scoop up salmon in sparkling water; in other shots, a couple of foxes leap across the grass in the middle of a Treadwell monologue.  The footage is full of stunning incidental beauties."

The late Roger Ebert awarded the film 4/4 stars saying, "I have a certain admiration for his courage, recklessness, idealism, whatever you want to call it, but here is a man who managed to get himself and his girlfriend eaten, and you know what?  He deserves Werner Herzog."

Herzog is well known for his eccentric subjects who often border on, if not plunge headlong into, madness.  He finds these broken characters the most interesting and gives their lives the stories they deserve.  You will not want to miss this wonderfully mesmerizing portrait of man who walked that fine line between passion and insanity.  Hope to see you there!

Here's the trailer:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gWycuaWJFCM

August Film Club: Documentary #1

Hey folks!  Riding the tonal wave created in Restrepo, we will be moving on to a film that is possibly even more serious than the last.  For our first August documentary, we will be watching Werner Herzog's harrowing descent into the world of capital punishment in his deeply moving and astounding film:  Into the Abyss.

Into the Abyss is a documentary film written and directed by Werner Herzog about two men convicted of a triple homicide which occurred in Conroe, Texas.  The film profiles Michael Perry, a man on death row convicted of murdering Sandra Stotler, a fifty-year-old nurse of German descent.  He was suspected, but never charged, in two other murders which occurred in Conroe, Texas, with his accomplice Jason Burkett.  Perry was convicted eight years earlier of the October 2001 murder, apparently committed in order to steal a car for a joyride.  Perry denies that he was responsible for the killings, blaming Burkett (also appearing the in film) who was convicted of the other two murders.  Burkett, who received a lesser life sentence for his involvement, likewise blames Perry.  Perry's final interviews for the film were recorded only 8 days before his execution on July 1, 2010.  The film also includes interviews with victims' families and law enforcement officers.  The film does not focus on Perry's guilt or innocence, and has a minimal amount of narration, with Herzog, unlike in many of his films, never appearing onscreen.

The film received generally positive reviews, currently holding a 91% certified fresh rating on Rottentomatoes.com out 101 critical reviews.

This is what I wrote immediately after watching the film for the first time:  "Into the Abyss, here is a sad, moving unbiased look at the death penalty; those involved in the crimes, the families of the victims, the guards, the chaplains, and the perpetrators themselves.  Though opposed to the death penalty, Herzog has no agenda, he simply lets them tell their stories, lets us reflect on the events that have transpired, and on their lives, and lets us have a glimpse into it all.  The "abyss" seems to refer less to capital punishment and more to the depths of pain and suffering human beings not only deal to one another but also endure."

We will be watching this wonderfully made film Thursday, August 15th at 6:15pm, hope to see you all there!

Here's the trailer:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VvFSEDuByoQ