Why don't people specifically watch more old films? I love them myself.
I've decided to choose two, one a perhaps little known, but wonderful British murder/mystery film from 1952 "Mr. Denning Drives North". It's okay the link doesn't give any of plot away:
Mr. Denning Drives North - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Here's the full film, 1 hour 27 minutes:
Then as I love Basil Rathbone and Nigel Bruce, as Sherlock Holmes and Doctor Watson. I think "Sherlock Holmes and The House of Fear" from 1945 is excellent and very atmospheric.
Here's the full film, 1 hour 9 minutes:
If you watch these films, hopefully you'll like them.
I've never ever cared for films. I think it's generally a waste of time and for the most part a bunch of rubbish, at least the Hollyweird crapola.
True story: I once lived with a couple who watched films almost constantly except on Thursdays when they chanted (they were Buddhists). And they'd run their TV at screaming volume that made it impossible to tune out anywhere in the house. From that experience, hearing the constant barrage of sounds without watching the video, I concluded that Hollyweird movies consist of three basic elements, repeated and rotated over and over, for the duration of the film. These are:
I just need something deeper than that.
- Explosions and gunshots
- Car chases and crashes
- Women screaming
And if a film is based on a book invariably it doesn't do justice to the story, because it can't.
Perhaps a film has the same limitations a TV set has --- it makes you sit in one spot and shut up and then dictates every sensory input, dictates what the characters look like, how they talk, what the scenery looks like, and you end up ingesting a visual artifact instead of a story --- as opposed to the printed page where those characters, those scenes, those nuances are left up to your own imagination. It lets the brain breathe.
About once every ten years somebody takes me out to a movie for my birthday. The last one was Borat. But I dug it.
There are movies that are deep. However, like all forms of entertainment movies have different goals, to make you think, to escape, to laugh, to cry, to inform, and some just to please the senses. There have been over half million movies made, from masterpieces to pieces of fluff to pure escapism, to boring wastes of time.
Exactly, and the mass produced majority of them are simply put out to make money for the studio and not for any kind of consideration of art. I guess I regard that with the same disdain I have for commercial music.
OP will certainly know what I'm talking about there, right Oosie?
Even your previous post about "The Stranger" notes that it's the only Orson Welles movie to make a profit. That should be irrelevant. Every time I hear _____ movie made $X gazillion at the box office I hear it as a reason to ignore it. It shouldn't be a negative reason, but it sure is not a positive.
Unfortunately without the profits, there would be few if any movies. I have no problem with people making a lot of money but I certainly have a problem with talented actors, directors, and writers producing garbage simply because it's quick, easy, and profitable. Audiences and critics should come down hard on these people. Have you notice how many talented actors and actresses at the peak of their career start selling their name and not their talents. One that comes to mind is Robert De Niro who went from, "Bang the Drum Slowly", Raging Bull, Mean Streets, The Godfather, Taxi Driver, The Deer Hunter, Falling In Love, to Dirty Grandpa, The Heist, and and a slew of mediocre movies that he played supporting rolls and got top dollar. Another is Meryl Streep with a record 21 Academy Award nomiations, winning 3 and 31 Golden Globe nominations, winning eight - more nominations, and more wins than any other actor. Dustin Hoffman is another that is living off his name, The Graduate, Midnight Cowboy, Little Big Man, All President's Men, Tootsie, and Rain man and now he does Kung Foo Panda and movies thrown together in few weeks in which he makes as much as the rest of cast for putting in a couple of appearances.
Point well taken although I know virtually nothing about any of those films. I've seen literally two of them out of the list (Rain Man and Godfather) (and I'd never want to see the latter again).
I will say this though. If the measure of a great actor is that you can sit and watch an entire flick to the end without ever recognizing an actor you've seen before and then suddenly there they are in the credits, who knew, well I gotta give them props. I've only ever seen two actors do that and one of them was Dustin Hoffman.
(The other was Marisa Tomei).
I've seen deNiro on SNL a few times and he looks like a complete amateur. Maybe he's just not made for the TV format.
Last edited: