The Last Film You Saw....

[Shake me up Judy]

Classic film. All the Powell and Pressburger movies are a treasure of cinema. It was nice to see it in 4K too. Roger Livesey was a fine actor. There were always some beautiful roles for women in their films too. Deborah Kerr shone in this one. 

[Shake me up Judy]

Been watching a lot of classic Westerns over the Christmas period. When I was a kid, sat with my pop and crisps in those Saturday matinees, Westerns were a simple and childlike moral universe. As I got older and the films became more complex and troubling, I realised that all human life was contained in the genre of the Western. All the great movie directors had learnt this long before I did.

So I sat down the other day to one of my absolute favourites, True Grit (1969) with the Duke, John Wayne. [Not the poor remake with Jeff Bridges]. While it doesn't have any great psychological depth or thematic complexity it's a hell of an entertainment. Two beautiful bookends with Glen Campbell's lonesome cowboy vocal over the soaring theme that opens the film; and the very moving final scene in the snow covered graveyard before the blurred image of Wayne riding away on his horse into the mythical west. I shed a tear at this point.

Glen is just along for the ride but the rest of the cast is superb: Robert Duvall; Strother Martin; Dennis Hopper; Jeff Corey; Kim Darby et al. The folksy dialogue is perhaps what really makes it, adapted from Charles Portis' wonderful novella, and very funny. Some beautiful big vistas too once the journey gets underway. I hope to watch it again before too long...

[Chinahand]

Thanks SMUJ.

I watched Big Country a few days ago. Thought it was absolutely brilliant and with lots of psychological depth in the different relationships.

It also has the classic, classic western score.

Really recommend it:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000cs0z

 

[Chinahand]

I've just watched the Chinese film So Long My Son on iplayer

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m001kr83

In Chinese the title is very different: 地久天长 which is a phrase for something like enduring or everlasting.

It's a beautiful, slow film full of regret, memory, what could have been, and how friendships and families both endure and shrink and grow as tragedy and circumstance wrought their changes.

Its covers 25 or so years from the mid 80s to something like the 2010s as China goes through reform. The introduction of the one child policy and its consequences are a major theme, as are the reforms which saw the end of the Iron Rice Bowl (where families were supported by state industries) and the development of a far more perilous world of free wheeling capitalism with Chinese characteristics.

Three couples are friends, and two have boys born on the same day, but fate brings tragedy and regret, and three very different paths of life through what is known as China's Era of Reform.

The acting is understated, but especially for the main couple quite brilliant; the dad using drink and anger to survive through a world he'd never wanted or could quite comprehend is a masterclass.

The slow panning shots, and story telling in flashback where initially little is explained and understanding slowly emerges won't be for everyone, but I found quite mesmeric.

8/10

Edited January 6 by Chinahand
Got the name wrong!

[John Wright]

On 1/4/2025 at 1:41 AM, Chinahand said:

I've just watched the Chinese film Fair Well My Son on iplayer

Isn’t it called So Long My Son?

[Chinahand]

19 hours ago, John Wright said:

On 1/4/2025 at 12:41 AM, Chinahand said:

I've just watched the Chinese film Fair Well My Son on iplayer

Isn’t it called So Long My Son?

Oops ... Thanks, I've edited my post to correct my mistake.