The 1964 Mini-List

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#26 Post by **swo17** » Thu Jul 07, 2022 1:52 pm

I've added the Guest film.

Film series present a special case where the value is presumed to lie in the totality of the work, which would be misserved by voting on each installment separately. In such cases I assign the work to the year in which it originated

#27 Post by **Matt** » Thu Jul 07, 2022 6:15 pm

The first entry in the series was actually an episode of the TV documentary series “World in Action,” and no follow-up films were planned at that time.

I’d rather the films be treated individually as that was how they were made and distributed, but since only one of them is actually eligible for this 1960s project, I suppose it really doesn’t matter. Vote for the first one, vote for the whole series, it’s the same difference for the purposes of this list.

knives · #28 Post by **knives** » Thu Jul 07, 2022 6:31 pm

I’m with Matt in full.

#29 Post by **swo17** » Thu Jul 07, 2022 7:59 pm

That's fair. Here is how I propose to handle this (which has precedent in other decade projects I've run): Both "Seven Up!" and "The Up Series" will be included in the 1964 poll. If you believe the series is better considered in its entirety, you can vote for it now, and this will be your only chance to do so. If you believe that each installment should be considered on its own merits, you can vote for each one when they come up. For 1964, the series and first installment will compete against each other as though they were two separate films

#30 Post by **Matt** » Thu Jul 07, 2022 10:15 pm

I didn’t mean to advocate for cutting the baby in half, I was just saying that however you choose to conceive of your vote for “The Up Series” in this particular list (as a vote for the first film or as a vote for the series whole), the vote would still count the same. That freed me up from feeling like I need to watch everything through 63 Up, 17 hours of film, in order to place it in my list.

By making them separate entities, they now compete for votes. But there is precedence for this, and already we have in this list Ro.Go.Pa.G and each of its constituent parts. It gives people choices, and it’s not like we’re voting for elected representatives or placing monetary bets on the outcome.

#31 Post by **swo17** » Thu Jul 07, 2022 10:42 pm

I was originally going to ask if anyone wanted to vote for the whole series and maybe put it to a vote, but then I realized that the poll is already an opportunity to do just that. Now I guess I need to put my money where my mouth is and watch all 17 hours myself (some of which I don't believe I've seen before, but I do have the whole Network Blu-ray set). Right after I finish watching the 1-hour circulating segment of footage from Empire eight times in a row

alacal2 · #32 Post by **alacal2** » Fri Jul 08, 2022 9:02 am

Hmm.Seems a reasonable decision but am really torn now having watched the whole series over its 63 years! This was genuinely groundbreaking, radical and not a little subversive. The attempt to explore the premise of "give me a child until he is seven and I will give you the man" seemed both simple and brilliant - and which is both validated and challenged over time. The first episode inevitably gains depth and resonance from subsequent ones and each new episode really felt like 'event' TV. Apted - who played a smaller part in Seven Up but helmed the rest of the series - never hid his views about class but never allowed ideology to trump his humanity. I've been watching clips on YouTube this morning and it still moves me to tears - like an old family album. Totally life-affirming.

#33 Post by **domino harvey** » Sat Jul 09, 2022 2:42 pm

It's so incompetent that its innocence stops it from ever rising quite to the levels of the most offensively bad outputs of the nouvelle vague movement, but Guy Gilles' L'Amour à la mer is truly the most amateurish and incompetent French New Wave film I've seen yet, and folks, I've seen more than almost anyone else alive. How Gilles managed to talk a murderer's row of French film stars, including Jean-Pierre Leaud, Jean-Claude Brialy, Alain Delon, and Juliette Greco, to consent to cameos in this home movie is beyond me, but I wouldn't buy any land from this Guy. I had previously seen Gilles' later film, Au pan coupe, which I didn't care for but it at least showed some degree of competency. This movie makes Le bel age look like Welles, with inconsistent zooms and pans and layered the Locket-style flashbacks pounding one nonsensical "deep" moment after another to zero positive effect. As I said in my write up to Le bel age, this kind of thing is exactly what I'd think films made by well-meaning amateurs would look like, and just goes to show how talented the names we know from this movement really were right out of the gate. The effusive reviews for this on Letterboxd are all the evidence you need that no one on that app knows anything about film.

diamonds · #34 Post by **diamonds** » Sat Jul 09, 2022 3:02 pm

Wow, to each their own. I was by turns astonished and moved throughout Gilles' tender, lyrical, textured, heartbroken film and came away wondering just why it isn't regarded as one of the supreme masterpieces of the New Wave. It plays like a Demy film with his Resnais influence dialed up to 11, fragments of lost and wounded love ebb and flow along with dreamy shifts between B&W and color stock. I think it's beautiful. But I suppose I don't know anything about film.

#35 Post by **domino harvey** » Sat Jul 09, 2022 3:09 pm

Well, you get grandfathered in since I know you do. I think this has been waylaid and forgotten for a reason, but yes, to each to their own

#36 Post by **domino harvey** » Sat Jul 09, 2022 3:58 pm

Interestingly, I only found two mentions of Gilles (as a director, not an actor) in Cahiers at this time, and none specifically on this film (save a still being used to illustrate the ballot mentioned below). One was his participatory ballot in their survey on French filmmaking, and the other was an offhand remark by Luc Moullet that Gilles is one of a handful of contemporary directors who play the main role in their own film (he labels all of these directors, and Gilles' is "narcissisme", so take that as you will)

A few years down the road, I see Gilles was lumped together with Demy and Reichenbach (?!) as sentimental filmmakers who know how to effectively use music in Jean-Louis Comolli's denunciation of Claude Lelouch's cinematic "impotencies"

diamonds · #37 Post by **diamonds** » Sat Jul 09, 2022 4:28 pm

Supposedly Cahiers also devoted a page to him upon his death in 1996, which I would be curious to read. Reichenbach's placement in that group is certainly interesting, though I can see it. One of the things I most remember from America as Seen by a Frenchman is the poignant use of Michel Legrand's mournful "Les Délinquants" over the opening and closing portions of the prison rodeo. (A song which, incidentally, Legrand would reuse many decades later just as memorably for the opening credits of Welles' The Other Side of the Wind).

#38 Post by **swo17** » Sat Jul 09, 2022 4:53 pm

In any case, I've added L'Amour à la mer as eligible for diamonds' benefit

therewillbeblus · #39 Post by **therewillbeblus** » Sun Jul 10, 2022 7:10 pm

I'll try to write up some films that I think may need support and that don't think I've recorded thoughts on before:

Goldfinger: Even if it's not my personal favorite Bond, it's the most entertaining, and a perfectly-balanced combo of everything Bond did right in this period. The narrative has a vibrant forward momentum, fluidly across segregated act structures, and characters- be they villains, peers or female accomplices- are introduced and exit in ways that earn their participation and never overstay their welcome. The sheer fun of setpiece-hopping throughout the distinctive arcs is reminiscent of North By Northwest, a film that more Bonds and general episodic spy films should be using as a blueprint, just as the best Mission Impossible film did for its constitutional skeleton before infusing its core with unique artistic DNA.

Robinson Crusoe on Mars: Another pleasurable, low-stakes/energy ride, this film has always been something of a comfort food for me.. only in movie form, obviously. Way better than it has any right to be, and perhaps the most interesting and consistently engaging adaptation of Crusoe's story, probably because the film's sci-fi setting milks the creative possibilities of his predicament in a foreign space but using familiar critical thinking skills and adaptive resourcefulness with novel stimuli. It's like a movie version of a child's What Would I Do If- survivalist fantasies, only set on Mars instead of your intimate contexts on Earth.

Seance on a Wet Afternoon: I just revisited this today and it's still as chilling and involving as it was when I first watched it ten years ago. Kim Stanley's performance is a marvel, as she plays a sensational and disturbing narcissistic personality, and Richard Attenborough is more than up to the task as her meek sparring partner of a husband, who understandably doesn't know quite how to contend with this kind of walking untreated-and-dangerous mental health disorder. The film rings true to the experience of ingrained relationship dynamics built around specific mental illness and grief, and while the film never serves as a commentary on either, that seems to be a strength rather than a weakness as its refusal to box up 'reaction to grief' or 'reaction of a mentally ill person' would invalidate the whole messy, complex system that is inseparable. The thriller components admirably never flinch from dragging out, which would undercut Attenborough's brutal contention with his conscious and humane anxiety to his immoral activity. By leaning into these stretches, Forbes respects his characters and the events they're caught up in. As a thriller, it's above-average, but check this one out for the performances that elevate a B-move plot into raw socio-philosophical horror that becomes psychological catharsis by the film's unexpectedly-touching and harmonic conclusion.

Also, I don't know if this is a 'fair' request, but if anyone here adores Marnie and is willing or able to write up why, I'd love to read a fervent defense. It's one of those Hitchcocks that I repeatedly find myself attracted to, touch the stove, and wind up wanting something more or different than what we get. I know the film has its fans, and I'd even consider myself one up to a point, but I don't think I'm seeing what you all see. I'm itching for a (I don't know, fifth, sixth?) viewing, so I'll revisit it soon to see where it lands on my list, but not sure if I'll have anything of substance to add to my last recording of a half-admiring/half-shrugging response.

Edit: I just stumbled across colin’s writeup from ~12 years ago and it’s a great reading! I’ll keep searching the forum, as I’m sure there are more recent defenses as well

dustybooks · #40 Post by **dustybooks** » Sun Jul 10, 2022 8:57 pm

I’ll have some words about Marnie for sure; I love it but I haven’t seen it in many many years and plan to revisit in the next few weeks.

#41 Post by **Matt** » Sun Jul 10, 2022 9:12 pm

I revisited Seance on a Wet Afternoon last night as well and it was even better than I remembered it. I thought it might be something to round out the list at #25, but I’m certain it will rank much higher. Such strong performances and such a pervasive tone of sadness and desperation.

Fans of this should also check out Bryan Forbes’ 1967 film, The Whisperers. Similar in tone and style with a fantastic central performance by Dame Edith Evans and another lovely John Barry score. It’s frustratingly hard to see, not available on any streaming service, but there is a Kino Lorber Studio Classics Blu-ray out. It will definitely be on my 1967 list, and I would love for it to not be an orphan!

alacal2 · #42 Post by **alacal2** » Tue Jul 12, 2022 9:26 am

It's on YouTube

therewillbeblus · #43 Post by **therewillbeblus** » Fri Jul 15, 2022 5:41 am

Matt wrote: Sun Jul 10, 2022 9:12 pm Fans of this should also check out Bryan Forbes’ 1967 film, The Whisperers. Similar in tone and style with a fantastic central performance by Dame Edith Evans and another lovely John Barry score. It’s frustratingly hard to see, not available on any streaming service, but there is a Kino Lorber Studio Classics Blu-ray out. It will definitely be on my 1967 list, and I would love for it to not be an orphan!

My lib has the KL blu and it really looks fantastic- the visual style alone is incredibly elastic in delving into the psychological subjectivity of Evans and also granting distance to obfuscate our perspective in the vein of The Servant, only less deliberately-directed towards a specific surreal goal, demonstrating an intimate decline in cognizance and a clinical look at manipulation and exploitation at once. I can see how it's of a piece with Seance in this respect, as that film similarly dragged out agonizing immoral behavior alongside subjective dread around it- though in this case the latter is not layered into the same character committing the actions per se, but us as a surrogate for a helpless character alongside these vehicles of harm. I'm not sure how much I'll have to say about this in a few months (a second viewing would be critical for me to produce any thoughts of value) but it's a striking character piece that's uniquely defined by a complementary fusion of reserved yet captivating and intricate performance, and intrusive directorial mood-establishment, both going for broke on some eerie synced wavelength. This kind of approach could have (and often has) gone so wrong, but the stars aligned here, and I'll second the rec that it's well worth checking out.

alacal2 · #44 Post by **alacal2** » Fri Jul 15, 2022 1:17 pm

Gulp. My provisional watch=list is 46 of which 24 are first-timers.

knives · #45 Post by **knives** » Fri Jul 15, 2022 7:36 pm

Could you add Server Sundaram? It’s a great Tamil remake of Pagnol’s Le Schpountz starring Jerry Lewis lookalike Negesh. There’s a handful of changes from the provisional original such as a taste of Cyranno that makes it stand out as unique and lively including a more personal stake for the romance. It’s streaming on Amazon in great condition.

#46 Post by **swo17** » Fri Jul 15, 2022 8:25 pm

Added

#47 Post by **Matt** » Sat Jul 16, 2022 1:51 am

I want to make a plug for Naruse’s Yearning (Midareru), one of the last few movies he made in his long career. I don’t know that it’s his best film, but I think it’s his best film of the 1960s, and it certainly hits all the thematic marks one expects from Naruse: class and the cruelty of capitalism, family obligations (especially for wives and widows), real world obstacles to emotional fulfillment (including external economic pressures), tradition vs. modernity, etc.

Naruse has a real knack for simple but emotionally devastating denouements, and this might be (for my money) the greatest.

It goes without saying that Hideko Takamine (in her penultimate Naruse film) gives a marvelous performance, but so does Yûzô Kayama, who is maybe not as well known for domestic melodramas.

There are several elements about this film that remind me of Bernard Malamud’s novel The Assistant, not least the family grocery store setting. It seems highly unlikely that Naruse or his co-writer Zenzô Matsuyama would have read the book, but it makes for an amusing “what-if” train of thought to think about them adapting a novel about Jews in postwar Brooklyn to postwar Japan.

Rayon Vert · #48 Post by **Rayon Vert** » Sat Jul 16, 2022 1:57 am

It's a cinch for my top 10.

alacal2 · #49 Post by **alacal2** » Tue Jul 19, 2022 8:05 am

Me too! A fabulous film.The rightly lauded train scene is a standout but its the luminous performance of Hideko Takamine that makes this film sing.

the preacher · #50 Post by **the preacher** » Tue Jul 19, 2022 3:39 pm

Please add the following titles:
Cyrano et d'Artagnan [Cyrano and d'Artagnan] (Abel Gance)
El camino [The Path] (Ana Mariscal)
Geomeun meori [Black Hair] (Lee Man-hui)
Italiani brava gente [Attack and Retreat] (Giuseppe De Santis)
O Crime de Aldeia Velha [The Crime of Aldeia Velha] (Manuel Guimarães)
Rio Conchos (Gordon Douglas)
Sallah Shabati [Sallah] (Ephraim Kishon)
Selva Trágica [Tragic Jungle] (Roberto Farias)
Week-end à Zuydcoote [Weekend at Dunkirk] (Henri Verneuil)

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