criterionforum.org

It's because he's not in the film. He dropped out & was replaced by Tadanobu Asano.

Ah, I thought he was still in it. I didn't know that he was replaced.

knives wrote:Ah, I thought he was still in it. I didn't know that he was replaced.

You are Pamela McClintock of the Hollywood Reporter and I claim my £5.

A question to those who have seen the Personal Journey Through American Movies and My Voyage to Italy docs: Are there many spoilers to be had from the clips shown in these documentaries?

Feego wrote:A question to those who have seen the Personal Journey Through American Movies and My Voyage to Italy docs: Are there many spoilers to be had from the clips shown in these documentaries?

Yes, very much so in both. I recently re-watched My Voyage to Italy and it will focus on a film (Paisan for example) and cover the whole plot with Scorsese's observations. This is less the case with Personal Journey.. but I remember The Searchers, Duel in the Sun, High Sierra/Colorado Territory (among others) endings being discussed in detail.

To do the docs justice: every single time a film I had not seen was discussed in them, I wanted to see that film far more, because Scorsese's feeling for the core of the films and his emotional connection to that core comes through strongly- the plot details are given only so he can express fully what they mean to him.

matrixschmatrix wrote:To do the docs justice: every single time a film I had not seen was discussed in them, I wanted to see that film far more, because Scorsese's feeling for the core of the films and his emotional connection to that core comes through strongly- the plot details are given only so he can express fully what they mean to him.

Indeed they are both great, and I hope my comments didn't suggest otherwise. As the question was about spoilers though, I thought best to make clear that they're full of them.

Thanks to both of you. I did a little scanning on the IMDb to see what films were referenced in both docs, and I think I've seen enough of the ones included in American Cinema to watch with confidence. I'm less familiar with most of the Italian films, save obviously famous ones like Bicycle Thieves and La Dolce Vita. I think I'll go ahead and give them a go. I am looking particularly forward to the Italian one, as I would like to expand my knowledge of classic Italian cinema.

I think Voyage focuses on less films and longer on each Italian film (which is why I like it less) but honestly I don't remember much of what Scorsese said on each film spoiler or not, but rather remember his main thesis and that I want to watch every single one of the films he discussed. So I don't think it should be an issue

dda1996a wrote:I think Voyage focuses on less films and longer on each Italian film (which is why I like it less) but honestly I don't remember much of what Scorsese said on each film spoiler or not, but rather remember his main thesis and that I want to watch every single one of the films he discussed. So I don't think it should be an issue

I'd agree with that - the Italian cinema documentary is much more spoilery in the sense that Scorsese recounts entire plots of many of the films in detail (stuff such as the ending of L'eclisse or most of I Vitelloni, Umberto D., La Dolce Vita, etc. Though even with so much time spent on L'eclisse the ending is shortened with edits, which rather disrupts the entire point of the rhythm of the 'empty' shots!) often using five or ten minutes worth of footage. The American cinema documentary had a number of spoilers too (the ending of Duel In The Sun and so on), but it was usually spending only a minute or two on each film before swiftly moving on.

In some ways it is the difference between the American cinema film assuming a basic familiarity and making an argument using the films (where the footage might not be of the narrative 'spoiler' moments but the style and editing and elements that showcase a particular genre or auteur element) and the Italian cinema film being more about showcasing interesting films for an audience who might not have seen them.

The benefit of the Italian cinema documentary though is that going through entire films means that you have a minute or so before the major spoilers start to recognise and jump past an interesting looking but unseen film!

Is this just going to be a link to a Rolling Stones Greatest Hits CD?

No. Just one Rolling Stones song.

Finally got around to seeing Gangs of New York and thought it was surprisingly pretty great. Not DiCaprio's best performance, Diaz is "just" okay (but rather convincing instead of distracting), and the story is nothing special, but I think a lot of the criticisms along this line are failing to recognize that the film is aiming for something more ambitious and unconventional than a typical Hollywood historical epic. Granted, because of studio interference it doesn't completely succeed at this, but it does well enough that in its best moments the film is as powerful as anything Scorsese has done. With its immersive textures and incredible sets, it has a real sense of place and space that most of Scorsese's other films don't really have. (Sure, Taxi Driver paints a vivid picture of mid-70s NYC, but films like Goodfellas, Wolf of Wall Street, King of Comedy, The Aviator, The Departed, The Color of Money and Cape Fear, for example, are far more concentrated on their characters than their environments; OTOH, Casino does give us a beautiful sense of the titular space, and After Hours has a very tangible sense of location in its use of that small stretch of SoHo. Films like Bringing Out the Dead and Mean Streets probably fall somewhere in between these two poles). And so Gangs's typical revenge/romance narrative thankfully becomes less important in the second half, and we get a series of stunning set-pieces anchored purely by visual bravado, by electrifying (yet subdued for Scorsese) editing patterns and incredible production design. The conclusion's rather too pat and feels rushed, but all in all I really think this is one of his better films, if not among the absolute best just by nature of its messiness and more cliche'd moments.

I'd kill to see the original October 2001 cut, though, as from what I've heard it really goes further in the direction of trading a typical narrative POV for an omniscient, immersive experience. In a way, this film is like Scorsese's experiment in "spatial film," as a favorite critic of mine argued -- akin to similar experiments around this time like Spielberg's The Terminal or Fincher's Panic Room. One of the masters of this kind of filmmaking is Brian De Palma, and though a film like Gangs superficially has more in common with Cimino, Visconti, Kubrick and Coppola than De Palma, I think the film's reach for a kind of three-dimensional spatial immersion in a particular place reminds of that director's consistent ability to do just that. Again, Scorsese doesn't completely succeed, but when he does it's pretty stunning (thinking here of everything from the rigged election onward, a stream of terrific set-pieces).

I guess Paramount's too busy making truck monster movies.

Have Netflix opened a movie wide before? I thought they did limited qualifying engagements and then went VOD. Wonder if they'll handle this differently. It's a stack of cash to spend on a TV movie, particularly when Scorsese's last gangster picture made a fair chunk of its budget back domestically.

They've spent the same amount on the David Ayer-directed, Max Landis-scripted Will Smith/Joel Edgerton fantasy cop movie* that seems like a similar impossible-to-recoup investment without any theatrical release.

*Meaning it's about cops in a world of fantasy creature (Edgerton plays an orc)

The movie in my head where Will Smith fantasises about being a cop who looks like Joel Egerton already sounds like a better bet.

#dreamcopslivesmatter

If we are talking about fantasy world cops I think I'll stick with Upworld, thank you very much! [-(