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Monday, July 25, 2005
Spotting Richard Grieco
Ms. Hammer and I have been running through movies lately a senior administration official goes through excuses for leaking classified information about undercover CIA operatives. Her last two picks were 21 Grams and Hero. We can watch each other's movies -- otherwise we wouldn't be married, would we? -- but we do have different tastes. For example, in watch 21 Grams she's likely to remember that Naomi Watts was in Tank Girl 10 years ago. I'm more likely to be flipping through channels and spot Richard Grieco in Phantom Force.
That said, the one thing that has held us together all these years is our mutual loathing for Citizen Kane. How have so many otherwise intelligent people been convinced that this torpid experiment in self-indulgence is one of the greatest films of all time?
13 Comments:
Was that the karate/ninja Hero, or the Dustin Hoffman/plane-crash Hero?
By 
, at
12:46 PM
The karate version. Crouching Tiger/Hidden Dragon.
I somewhat agree with you about CK. From a filmmaking standpoint, it is unmatched. Wells introduced many techniques and shots that became part of the filmmaking vocabulary. In this sense, the movie lives up to its billing. However, as for the story, pacing and watchability... it is long, boring, and overwraught. I can't stand the sucker.
In my very unprofessional opinion, Rules of the Game is twice the movie as CK. If you want to watch some good Orson Wells stuff, I suggest A Touch of Evil (with Charlton Heston playing a Mexican...very funny) and The Third Man. The Third Man is one of my all time favorite movies. Wells' performance is the greatest supporting act of all time. He also has the greatest movie speech of all time:
"In Italy for thirty years under the Borgias they had warfare, terror,murder and bloodshed,but they produced Michaelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci and the Renaissance. In Switzerland, they had brotherly love,they had five hundred years of democracy and peace-and what did that produce?The cuckoo clock."
Best. Line. Ever.
We here at the CP household don't watch a lot of TV, but we are big-time movie watchers with a similar difference of taste. The last movie that we watched together that we both liked was The Jacket with Adrian Brody and Kiera Knightly. It was pretty decent.
Our mutual movies are Beetlejuice, Willie Wonka (the original), and School of Rock. Her favorite movies are Beetlejuice, Pretty Woman, and Hitch. Mine are the Third Man, Rules of the Game, Bottle Rocket and Cabin Boy. We differ just a little bit in our tastes.
cp
By , at
1:29 PM
The man who invented the saw was not necessarily a great architect. I respect Welles's directorial contributions. I also think calling Citizen Kane a great movie is very similar to giving Pacino an Oscar for Scent of a Woman.
It's not just that he invented the saw, he invented large chunks of the language of film. CK is great for the technical aspect of basically inventing modern movie making. It is a horrible piece of crap because...well, its damn near unwatchable.
To pursue the architecture thing a bit further...imagine that it is the Home Insurance building (1st skyscraper in Chicago). It gave people the ideas and know-how to move up, up, up and create more wonderous city architecture, but, by itself...not so much.
Wells made up for his excess by making such gems like Touch of Evil and the Magnificent Ambersons.
Pacino winning that award was a travesty. He was well into his "WHO-HA!" period by that point and was nearly unwatchable. I'm glad to see he has toned it back a bit of late. Merchant of Venice was a nice effort.
cp
By , at
3:11 PM
I'm going to go out on a limb here and guess that there is no one else in the world who loves both The Third Man and Cabin Boy.
Cabin Boy is Letterman's finest film.
For awhile, there, Pacino forgot to act and just shouted.
I have another prop you could put in the poll:
Letterman's monkey from Cabin Boy. Not very popular...but VERY funny.
Third Man is best viewed following a screening of Cabin Boy.
cp
By , at
4:28 PM
no one else in the world who loves both The Third Man and Cabin Boy.
Wrong again, Jambo. Count me in as a big fan of both.
Pacino in Scent of a Woman was rather malodorous. I'm sure it's been done before, but y'all oughta start a list of worst Oscars ever. I nominate Ghost's win for best original screenplay. Another contender: Dances With Wolves for best director and film, not only because it wasn't that good, but also because Scorsese's Goodfellas was a thousand times better. At least Pesci won that year.
By 
Joseph Thvedt, at
12:45 AM
I'm still upset that John C. Reilly (Chicago) lost best supporting actor to Chris Cooper (Adaptation). Does that make me weird?
By , at
10:27 AM
I suspect that Joseph is somewhat like Hammer in the fact that he is willing to say many outlandish things just to get a reaction from me. He once even claimed he was going to support Pierre DuPont for president! Clearly a man to be taken with a grain of salt.
Re: du Pont -- any man that George H. W. Bush called "nutty" was OK by me.
By Joseph Thvedt, at
3:00 PM
