Nitpicking the Masters: Tiny Flaws in Great Masterpieces

[Robotron]

Alright here's one that's bothered me since the first time I saw it. In Bring Me the Head of Alfredo Garcia, someone is getting their hair cut early in the movie, and the barber just keeps cutting with his scissors rapidly, but the hair is obviously about a good 4 inches away. Has anyone caught this one?

That is actually one of my favorite parts of the whole movie. The whole scene where Benny confronts Elita has a very surreal flavor to it (what, exactly, is a small orchestra doing playing for no one in an empty room?) and that is the most bizarre moment of all.

EDIT: One that quite bothers me is in the King of Comedy. In Rupert's presumably autobiographical monologue at the end, he talks about his mother having been dead for nine years, despite having talked to her earlier in the movie.

[Sloper]

I love that bit in the King of Comedy! It suggests that those scenes where he talks to his mother are fantasy too - remember how you never see her? (Her voice is that of Scorsese's mother, in fact.) And remember how he tells Jerry Lewis that he makes jokes out of all the terrible, painful things in his life? The whole standup routine at the end seems to me like a sort of catalogue of miseries, and the mother thing is one of the most chilling details. It makes him a bit like Norman Bates, doesn't it? But I don't think that continuity error could have got past the film-makers' notice.

[whaleallright]

I find the appearance of the stag in ALL THAT HEAVEN ALLOWS awkward, in part, because its status as a Symbol is unbalanced by its status as an actual stag, who looks confused and wanders about outside the cabin set. I know this could feed into the arguments for Sirk as Brechtian, but the effect seems too compositionally uncontrolled for that (not to mention I think these sort of effects are falsely ascribed to Brecht).

[mattkc]

I find the appearance of the stag in ALL THAT HEAVEN ALLOWS awkward, in part, because its status as a Symbol is unbalanced by its status as an actual stag, who looks confused and wanders about outside the cabin set. I know this could feed into the arguments for Sirk as Brechtian, but the effect seems too compositionally uncontrolled for that (not to mention I think these sort of effects are falsely ascribed to Brecht).

I know that, at least for me, the greatness of the final shot of ATHA has nothing to with being "Brechtian" at all. In fact, personally I'm really tired of the term. I mean, critics can call certain filmmakers "Brechtian" all they want, but it's become such a cliche that it hardly seems like it means anything. Plus, it does not apply to Sirk. Just as any great artist's work cannot be reduced to a single interpretation, a single phrase or line or two.

As I said before, to me the stag is entirely "Sirkian." And no, that doesn't mean "Brechtian" at all. It rhymes with many other moments throughout his whole oeuvre. Some may find it kind of a funny moment, and in some obvious way it is - it's also tragic, in a kind of similar (but not immediately apparent) way that the end of Imitation of Life is, with Sarah Jane grasping at her mother's casket, begging for forgiveness, but finding only an imitation of life. On the surface ATHA has a happy ending, but does any Sirk really have a truly "happy ending"? They're surrounded by superficiality and materialism, including their own. To repeat myself, the stag is like the monkey at the end of A Scandal in Paris, the toys in There's Always Tomorrow - it's almost like there's no difference, between the human beings and the animals and the inanimate objects, which so often seem to relate directly to the characters and their actions. This artificiality is everywhere in his films: in the lighting (which he described as "not naturalistic"), in the compositions, in the editing.

For a long time one could be laughed at for writing seriously on Sirk. Most of the attention his films have gotten have been for the wrong reasons: people saw them as "campy," etc. And part of his "popularity" came from stuff Fassbinder wrote on him (which sucks), then Far From Heaven (also sucks), which suggests most have never actually understood his films. As Fred Camper points out:

"Sure, his colors are alluring, and his exaggerations have a certain bleak humor. But ultimately Sirk wasn't in it for the laughs: he was a fatalist, someone who once said that 'happiness exists, if only by virtue of the fact that it can be destroyed.'"

[LionelHutz]

I'll probably be hanged for this,but one tiny thing that has always bothered me are the end credits of Paths of Glory.
The ending is certainly one of the best final scenes in cinema and gives me the goosebumps every time I see it..still just after "the end" there are those credits with all the actors smiling and that cheerful music which just seems out of place to me.
Technically the film is over,so I shouldn't even complain,but it struck me all the time!

[miless]

what I always hate is when directors use a graduated filter to darken the sky... it looks so fake (especially to have an amber/brown sky)

there's one moment in Army of Shadows where this occurs and it almost takes me out of it.

[zedz]

what I always hate is when directors use a graduated filter to darken the sky... it looks so fake (especially to have an amber/brown sky)

That's a good call. Why do directors and DPs think this looks cool and atmospheric and not TV-movie cheap? Another pet peeve is Spielbergian shooting stars in the Palomar-detailed night sky. Fake, fake, fake, fake, fake (apologies to Elaine). They're particularly intrusive in Scorsese's Cape Fear (not that it's necessarily a masterpiece).

[Via_Chicago]

what I always hate is when directors use a graduated filter to darken the sky... it looks so fake (especially to have an amber/brown sky)

there's one moment in Army of Shadows where this occurs and it almost takes me out of it.

Yeah, but complaining about cheap effects in a Melville film seems sort of silly. Look at the goddamned train in Un Flic, the plane in Army of Shadows, the superimposed rain in that film's opening sequence (or the photographed backdrop after the bar scene), the giant spiders crawling towards Yves Montand in Le Cerlce Rouge (these are my favorite fake creatures of any film...they're that silly), etc., etc. None of this shit really bothers me anymore.

P.S. I don't think Melville did it to make it look "cool," maybe bleak (probably just because, despite the film's large budgets by Melvillian standards, it was still a rather cheap affair), but definitely not cool.

[akaten]

I also tend to find that Melville's ambitions in terms of productions values are an unwanted distraction, but trying to fight against limited means and resources are a part of what makes him a great director. I'd rather have ropey special effects than have the thematic and stylistic core of his films altered if he had chosen to work in a more conventional studio/client manner.

My pet peeve is in an early scene in Kiss Me Deadly (Robert Aldrich 1955) during the early scene in which as the camera pulls to a longer shot with Mike Hammer falling of the bed, showing her legs in the background they aren't moving, then a few shots later they stop moving.

You might think that sounds like a minor case of poor continuity, but it undermines the otherwise expert way in which Aldrich first disorientates and confuses the viewer leading into the scene, and then relays information piece meal with the use of various shots.

Screams, Mike Hammer, Legs shaking violently, shoes of the attackers, voices, the wrench and so forth, utterly devastating scene in its implications of horrible violence apart from that one oversight damages my appreciation of it.

[LionelHutz]

Definetely not a masterpiece,but I've always found distracting the horrible score of "And justice for all"...A cheap lazy jazzy soundtrack which probably would be more appropriate for a porn film of the same age.
And on a different note,I can never manage to fully enjoy "Shadows" either,since everytime I watch it I get distracted trying to figure out the new footage from the one of the earlier version.

[Kinsayder]

The wolf whistle on the DOA soundtrack.

[Sloper]

The wolf whistle on the DOA soundtrack.

Amen to that - I totally forgot about it until I enthusiastically showed this film to someone recently... It was so embarrassing. And it just keeps happening! Over and over again... You do have to wonder whose idea this was. It isn't even a proper whistle. I reckon this is the most annoying nit I've ever picked.

[BenCheshire]

Andie Macdowell's line reading of (the script)

in Four Weddings and a Funeral.

And thanks everyone, I'd never noticed that "let's go to the window" line ine Kane, but I'm gonna notice it now!

Novak's hair annoys the crap out of me in Vertigo. Actually I just don't get the fascination with her. She looks so cheap. Well, maybe that's it.

[Napoleon]

Little Maria in Frankenstein (1931).

In the context of the story we are supposed to be frightened for her and hoping that the monster (for his sake) doesn't hurt her. The problem is that the girl playing her is so fake smiles & curtsies that I always encourage the monster to chuck her in the lake.

[Greathinker]

I'm not a fan of the drawn out, sentimental ending in The Burmese Harp.

[hieronymus]

re: ending of BREAKING THE WAVES

I'm surprised to see that mentioned here, since it is quite clear that Von Trier, the cerebral manipulator, organized the last shot to overthrow all that preceded it, all the realism and sachlich qualities. You can virtually see Von Trier grining offscreen.

You can either agree or disagree with the creator's intentions, but I don't think it's a "flaw" in any way. Flaw should be unintentional. And I liked the film purely for its ending.

The flaw that irritates me is the brief shot of Marvin's "fully integrated" head in the trunk at Jimmy's house in PULP FICTION. It was supposed to be blown up to pieces... That corpse was, you know, "minus a head."

[colinr0380]

re: ending of BREAKING THE WAVES

I'm surprised to see that mentioned here, since it is quite clear that Von Trier, the cerebral manipulator, organized the last shot to overthrow all that preceded it, all the realism and sachlich qualities. You can virtually see Von Trier grining offscreen.

I agree and think that is exactly what he intended - I still think it is a kind of betrayal of the audience though!

I think most audiences are aware that a handheld shaky camera is a sort of shorthand for a form of 'reality' and don't need an obviously artificial shot to show it is fake, at least not that late on in the film. It also perhaps underestimates an audience to expect that they aren't aware of the influence of the director on the action and how their biases or ways of thinking are expressed through their films and to think that being caught up in the characters in the film means that we are not also aware of being in a manufactured world - how we can be subjective and objective at the same time. However I'm fascinated by Breaking the Waves for setting the parameters for me as to what I'd accept and what I wouldn't - a lot of these issues come up again in the later films from the hardcore inserts of The Idiots to the musical sequences in Dancer and the chalk outlines of the US films, but the issues don't feel as grating in the later films, perhaps because the use of the devices adds to the dramas and gives us insight into the characters - the musical scenes add to Selma's tragedy, the rape goes on with the full awareness of the townspeople of Dogville, the hardcore sex inserts with porn body doubles, although brief, underlines the downturn of the commune. The bells in Breaking The Waves feel to me to less impact the drama (as Bess is gone at that point), but instead more acts like one of those producer-mandated happy endings!

I sometimes wonder if Breaking the Waves might have been his take on a Bresson film, which makes that last shot even more of a middle finger up to the audience!

But what else could we expect from a provocateur? It is certainly the most provocative thing he ever did for me! It is interesting that the later films somehow play fairer with their audience though.

[akaten]

My pet peeve is in an early scene in Kiss Me Deadly (Robert Aldrich 1955) during the early scene in which as the camera pulls to a longer shot with Mike Hammer falling of the bed, showing her legs in the background they aren't moving, then a few shots later they stop moving.

I always thought this shot was meant to show she was still alive? And then dead. After the shot of Hammer spreadeagled.

I'll watch it again. But surely Aldrich as AD and Editor on so many pictures is far removed from continuity errors. Like Siegel. Maybe a boom mike here or there but nothing serious.

I haven't the DVD (must make amends, great film!) so I'm not able to rewatch the way the scene is composed, but I'm pretty positive there is a cut with Mike Hammer falling off the bed where her legs are seen not to be moving before the shot, when her legs stopped moving, in effect her death scene. Perhaps the speed of the cutting and the disorientation had the effect of misleading me...

Hustle for instance doesn't contain a single wasted shot. (I love it but others don't.)

Sadly I've yet to see Hustle, though I've been impressed with the 70s film of Aldrich's I've seen, Ulzana's Raid in particular (off topic I know, see Emperor of the North Pole thread).

[HerrSchreck]

I'm not a fan of the drawn out, sentimental ending in The Burmese Harp.

Fun, fun .. F U N thread. Hello again folks.

I agree about the BURMESE HARP. Totally, though one must admit (I know I have had the following) the experience of watching others just start crying more & more, as if, if the letter went on a bit longer, the sappier members of the audience would start passing around a fucking razor blade and slash their wrists in neat order outa heaving grief.

Ditto on the wolf whistle in DOA. It reminds me of a great little Alton-lensed gem from the late 40's starring Turhan Bey called THE AMAZING MR X (atmosphere for weeks... run dont walk)... while Christine is meandering along the melancholic moonlit shore, the absurd scratchiness of her "husband's" voice going "Christeeeeeeeeeeennnn" makes me wanta rip a shoe off and klunk it thru the screen. Then I remember its my screen I paid money for it. It's like they got somebody's retarded uncle to do the "disembodied voice".

I also HATE the straight on "I'm a suffering person like all suffering people innna world who I incidentally represent in case you were to young to notice" shot of the oh-so-sad monster in SPIRIT OF THE BEEHIVE. The only thing missing is a fucking hug with ointmenty sighs and mutual nonsexual stroking of each other's hair to bring up soothing goosebumps in closeup. Furchrissakes.

In SHE (the Cooper one) when they first reach the subterranean tribe, and they start dancing around them, the best "ominous chant" this big budget film by the makers of--and as followup to-- KONG could come up with is "OO... Oo... Oo.. Oo".

John Garfield's ears in any flick he's in.

[lord_clyde]

In 'Dellamorte Dellamore', the floating lights in the cemetery are clearly lights on strings.

[Sloper]

I've always had more of a problem with John Garfield's forehead. There's something really distracting about the way it bunches up around his eyebrows. At least that's how it looks to me...

Just thought of an interesting one. There's a scene in Chimes At Midnight where Keith Baxter does the 'I know you all' speech with Falstaff within earshot - as he finishes the speech he winks. Now as far as I'm concerned it's a great scene, a lovely bit of acting, and the editing around the wink means it works perfectly...

But then I found out Keith Baxter hated it. It was the only scene they really rehearsed intensively, and when they watched the rushes Baxter asked Welles, 'Why did you make me wink?' Orson apparently agreed, and promised they'd never rehearse again! And now, because I know Baxter cringes every time he sees that wink, so do I. The artificiality of the speech makes sense, as it is Prince Hal's only soliloquy - but as with the ending of Breaking the Waves, rationalising it doesn't stop it from being annoying!

[hieronymus]

I sometimes wonder if Breaking the Waves might have been his take on a Bresson film, which makes that last shot even more of a middle finger up to the audience!

I'm pretty positive it is. My feeling is that he's quite skilled in manipulating the audience's heart through cerebral means. Of course, he gained this ability in the post-EUROPA era, and the culmination of it can be seen in DANCER IN THE DARK.

I'm not a fan of the drawn out, sentimental ending in The Burmese Harp.

Speaking of sentimental endings, it's always embarrassing to watch the overly sentimental, emotional, and preachy elements in any of Kurosawa's films. Like the ending of RASHOMON, or the latter act of IKIRU, where the theme is literally spelled out for you. I try to focus on his wonderful formal creativity--camera movement, editing, pacing, etc.--during those scenes.

[jorencain]

Speaking of sentimental endings, it's always embarrassing to watch the overly sentimental, emotional, and preachy elements in any of Kurosawa's films. Like the ending of RASHOMON, or the latter act of IKIRU, where the theme is literally spelled out for you.

Agreed. And then there are the groups of people sitting and sobbing together (opening of "Seven Samurai", or the servants in "Kagemusha"). Those elements feel so theatrical and unrealistic that they always take me out of the movie.

The same can be said for contagious laughter, as in the cartoon-watching scene in "Sullivan's Travels".

[colinr0380]

In 'Dellamorte Dellamore', the floating lights in the cemetery are clearly lights on strings.

But doesn't that make sense with the 'in a snowglobe' ending?

[zedz]

Duh! I've only just remembered my ultimate example: the syrupy coda montage (set to an even more syrupy J-Pop ballad) that mars the end of my favourite Kitano film, A Scene at the Sea. After carving a hard-won Keatonian grace out of unlikely material (deaf Zen surfer and deaf Zen girlfriend) and crafting a tasteful, powerfully minimalist tearjerker ending, we have to suffer through a grotesquely sentimental clip-show of 'memorable moments' from the movie before shuffling out of the theatre.

It's like sending Balthazar up a celestial staircase, darting wistful, teary glances back at us over his shoulder.