741 My Winnipeg

[Barmy]

I've seen all of Maddie's features. I liked them through and including Nymphs. My complaint is that Winnipeg was BORING and UNFUNNY. Moreover, Dracula and Coward (I barely remember them) were weak, and Brand was OK only because of the live performance element. Also I am tired of people saying that the Heart short is the best thing ever. It's good, that's it. Upshot: he's gone downhill. He needs to have more structure. Maybe he should do a comic book film.

The "acquired taste" thing is not an argument. Joe D'Amato is an acquired taste, but so what.

Edited to type forks and laps.

[MichaelB]

I've seen all of Maddie's features. I liked them through and including Nymphs. My complaint is that Winnipeg was BORING and UNFUNNY.

So boring and unfunny that you feel compelled to tell us this repeatedly, despite the obvious irony?

I don't have much to add to Matt and Chaddoli's defences, so I'll simply report that tonight's packed screening was punctuated by frequent laughter and ended with tumultuous applause - which continued long after Maddin had left the stage. And London arthouse audiences aren't exactly renowned for being either polite or especially demonstrative.

[Barmy]

Laps, laps, laps.

I saw it in a commercial theatre, i.e. a venue where normal people go. As I said, it got one titter. That's it. Your thing sounds like a special event that would be attended by Maddinophiles.

[domino harvey]

I've seen PBS on Sunday Nights, British people will laugh at anything

[MichaelB]

Your thing sounds like a special event that would be attended by Maddinophiles.

Who are all clearly so deluded that their judgement is hopelessly unreliable, whereas yours expresses such an absolute truth that it might as well be carved in tablets of stone.

Some people liked it, some didn't. I'm sorry for those that didn't, but that hardly invalidates the opinion of those that did. Pleasure is ultimately subjective, after all.

[origami_mustache]

I don't understand the boring complaint...I didn't know where the film was going to go next, and Maddin delivered unique imagery to match the eccentric tales...the repetitiveness served a rhythmic and poetic purpose. I suppose the only thing that bothered me was the use of stills. I thought they sort of cheapened things at times.

For me, the repetitive narration/images, combined with the constant assault of uninteresting stories/plot lines bored me to death. Like an earlier poster (LQ) said, if I heard anything about "the lap" or "the forks" again, I was going to jam a fork into my lap. It was like being at a community college poetry reading. Hell, a prison poetry reading.

Accompanying lousy poetry with pretty/occasionally gorgeous imagery doesn't make your lousy poetry any more interesting. It only serves to fool some people into thinking it's interesting.

I don't understand why there's a plethora of backlash against a script like Juno, and none against films like this. At least Juno didn't walk around saying "Honest to blog!" a hundred times during the film. Not that I'm necessarily defending Diablo Cody's occasionally grating dialogue.

The lap, the forks. The locker room. The forks. The showers. The forks, the lap. The forks.

Eh, I think you are taking Maddin too seriously whereas he should be taken more tongue and cheek. Juno on the other hand was just overwritten garbage that was in love with itself.

I've seen Maddin at screenings ad nauseum. He is extremely self-involved. Self-deprecation is a form of narcissism.

And just throwing gobs of images on a screen doesn't make it artful, so Sight and Sound can kiss my arse.

It all went awry after Ice Nymphs, when he started doing more explicitly pseudo-autobiographical stuff.

Oh c'mon Ice Nymphs is one of the worst films I've ever seen, but I like everything else he's done. Speaking of weak...referring to a film as "boring" is probably the weakest argument one could make. Maddin is no more self indulgent than any other great director...Bergman, Fellini, Godard, Tarkovsky, etc.

[sidehacker]

I can't really provide a rebuttal to anyone's compliants without sounding sort of mean but for what its worth, My Winnipeg was my first Guy Maddin experience and I instantly loved it. I don't think he is acquired taste, though I suppose his other films could be a lot different.

P.S. Does anyone know of any other semi-documentary / personal portraits type of films like this?

[origami_mustache]

I can't really provide a rebuttal to anyone's compliants without sounding sort of mean but for what its worth, My Winnipeg was my first Guy Maddin experience and I instantly loved it. I don't think he is acquired taste, though I suppose his other films could be a lot different.

P.S. Does anyone know of any other semi-documentary / personal portraits type of films like this?

Maybe Tarkovsky's The Mirror or Fellini's Amarcord could be considered such, although minus the documentary element.

[Barmy]

What exactly are the pro-Winnipegers saying is so great about this film?

The film is intended to be funny. It isn't. "Boring" is a legitimate criticism of a comedy.

What else about the film is so great? Savage's perf? No. She's a doddering old crone who can barely speak her lines.

The montage/pastiche? Please. Maddin can do this in his sleep. And it was much more amateurish in this film as compared to previous ones.

And most of the greats of the 60s and 70s worked to some degree within a studio system and were nowhere NEAR as self-indulgent as Guy and his little indie flix.

[origami_mustache]

"Boring" and "funny" are completely subjective opinions, so declaring a film to be bad without any further explanation doesn't really make me want to give your statements any credibility, not to mention you are making such broad assumptions about what a comedy should be (although it is much more than a comedy), what Maddin's intentions are, and how audiences should respond.

[Barmy]

My audience tittered once. It wasn't just me. I report, you decide.

[MichaelB]

The film is intended to be funny. It isn't. "Boring" is a legitimate criticism of a comedy.

It's also a highly subjective one by definition, and instantly countered by the equally legitimate opinion of someone who disagrees.

Give it a rest, Barmy. You didn't like the film, lots of other people did, and the world was still turning last time I checked.

[origami_mustache]

My audience tittered once. It wasn't just me. I report, you decide.

Yeah, you mentioned that several times...I guess that minute sample survey proves your point definitively. =D>

[sidehacker]

Maybe Tarkovsky's The Mirror or Fellini's Amarcord could be considered such, although minus the documentary element.

Not what I am looking for. I meant more along the lines of Sherman's March or Extreme Private Eros: Love Song 1974.

[portnoy]

anything by Caveh Zahedi, Doug Block's 51 Birch Street, Jonathan Caouette's Tarnation, some of Mark Wexler's stuff, Tom Joslin and Peter Friedman's Silverlake Life, the films of Alan Berliner, Judith Helfand's Blue Vinyl

[mfunk9786]

My audience tittered once. It wasn't just me. I report, you decide.

Yeah, you mentioned that several times...I guess that minute sample survey proves your point definitively.

So did mine. In fact, the one titter came from me, when he mentions that he "had his father exhumed and buried under the rug". No one else in the theater made a peep. I left a couple minutes before the credits rolled, and someone walked out as it ended and joked, "man, it really came together in the last couple of minutes."

People were coming out of the theater apologizing to their friends/significant others about recommending this one. I don't think anyone in my theater had a positive impression about what they just saw - they looked like they just watched grass grow for 90 minutes in the style of the Ludovico technique.

[MichaelB]

OK, just to amplify my last coment, some people liked it, some didn't, and readers of this thread have known for some time where its various contributors stand and can hopefully make up their own minds - so is there any point prolonging this moronic titfortattery?

Anyway, hopefully half this thread will be shunted off to a richly-deserved spot in the Infighting and Navel Gazing forum before too long, so I'll try to elevate matters with a link to Alex Fitch's Electric Sheep article Guy Maddin and the Mythologising of Winnipeg, and its companion-piece, an interview with the executive director of the Winnipeg Film Group that gives some insight into where his approach to film came from.

[mfunk9786]

Anyway, hopefully half this thread will be shunted off to a richly-deserved spot in the Infighting and Navel Gazing forum before too long,

Just because people are being vehemently defensive of whether they liked/didn't like the film doesn't mean that the discussion isn't legitimate.

[MichaelB]

The film's UK website was launched yesterday, and I'm half tempted to have a go at this tie-in filmmaking competition challenging entrants to make a 3-minute personal portrait of their own home town - though the upfront request to "Be as experimental and creative as you dare" is followed by small print that says:

Your Film will need to be U/PG rated according to BBFC guidelines (see). Films transmitted on Channel 4 are subject to the legal requirements from the OFCOM guidelines, as the 3 Minute Wonder slot is pre-watershed. This means no extreme violence, extreme sex or obscene nudity.Your Film must also comply with:

(a) Ofcom's Broadcasting Code (see) and must, in particular, be suitable for transmission on UK television prior to 9pm; and

(b) the CAP (Non-broadcast) Code (see).

I don't think much of Maddin's own work would have got past that!

[sidehacker]

Anyway, hopefully half this thread will be shunted off to a richly-deserved spot in the Infighting and Navel Gazing forum before too long

Just because people are being vehemently defensive of whether they liked/didn't like the film doesn't mean that the discussion isn't legitimate.

Yeah, but everyone who didn't like it is just saying something along the lines of "this movie is so bad that...blah blah blah" which is about as legitimate as a fat joke.

[Mr Sausage]

Anyway, hopefully half this thread will be shunted off to a richly-deserved spot in the Infighting and Navel Gazing forum before too long,

Just because people are being vehemently defensive of whether they liked/didn't like the film doesn't mean that the discussion isn't legitimate.

That's the problem. It's not the vehemence, but the defensiveness and subsequent pettyness. If people were inclined to be vehemently argumentative, that would be fine, we would at least be discussing ideas. Instead we have people declaring this or that thing is "not an argument" even while their own posts evidence not a spectre of one. People are just stating their opinions, forcefully, and then backing off from any discussion that could be meaningful. The criticisms "boring" and "unfunny" are shallow remarks precisely because they are absolute and unarguable. I can no more tell you that these things are wrong than you can explain to me why they are right. Tho' true, there is nothing to be had in them, at all. They're the antithesis of what should be posted in a thread.

So, ultimatum: start to get technical about the film, or really get into some appreciable depth about your reactions (ie. anything that could be conductive to sustained interesting discussion) or don't post anymore, because if the current tone continues I'll move all of it to a locked thread in the Infighting section and give this thread a chance at life again. (For the record I've never My Winnipeg).

[MichaelB]

I've just got back from a very pleasant evening in the company of Maddin and his producer-cinematographer Jody Shapiro.

The onstage interview saw him on terrific form, with anecdotes about the sky-high walk-out rate for his first few films (he used to stand at the back and hold the door open for people, which seemed the least he could do under the circumstances), what he was trying to do with the colour in Careful but failed through technical ineptitude (which is why he regards the wildly oversaturated video versions as superior to the 35mm prints, as he was able to compensate to some extent), why phrenology can be an effective method of casting extras (though not leads) and a touching reminiscence of working with the late Frank Gorshin and a decomposing baby ostrich on Twilight of the Ice Nymphs (the decomposing bit wasn't planned - someone switched off the freezer a few days before it was needed for shooting).

I also got a chance to see The Heart of the World on the big screen for the first time, which was the perfect appetiser.

The Maddin season is running till July 23, and includes all the features and a fair number of the shorts - more details here.

[Quot]

why phrenology can be an effective method of casting extras (though not leads)

do tell?!?

[MichaelB]

why phrenology can be an effective method of casting extras (though not leads)

do tell?!?

I can't remember the fine details (I was still jetlagged from a weekend trip to Canada and it was towards the end of a long evening - I'd had a two-hour head start on Maddin anecdotes thanks to attending a BFI dinner with him beforehand), but it was part of a general riff on alternative methods of casting people in his films.

But hopefully you'll be able to check for yourself at some point, as the interview was being filmed - I don't know for what purpose, but I suspect a future DVD extra may well be in prospect. (The UK edition of My Winnipeg, at a guess).

[foggy eyes]

Yikes, what is with all this Maddin-bashing? Admittedly, The Saddest Music in the World bored my socks off, but I'm surprised that his films manage to generate so much ire. Brand Upon the Brain! was a riot, and My Winnipeg is an excellent follow-up - the live narration at BFI Southbank was great, and so flawless that I forgot Maddin was actually present until he fluffed a line towards the end. As MichaelB has said, the audience was extremely appreciative, and the reaction was very much in keeping with Geoff Andrew's gushing intro.