{Of all lies, art is the least untrue - Flaubert}



Wednesday, June 20, 2007

Notes on Hiatus...

I am not able to blog for sometime now, as I am trying to settle in a new place. I am trying to see films, but not much. In last few days I have only seen two good films Rope and Late Marriage, and apart from that I saw Wes Anderson's The Royal Tenenbaums for a second time, which I think is a great film. I blurbed about some films in my last post, but I didn't write about few other films that I saw then, mainly because I was not able to get anything in them. The front runner in those films was Daisies. I still don't understand it after reading a bunch of reviews. Visually, it is very innovative with novel use of colors and cutting. Thematically with its pure negation to narrative and structure, I initially gathered that the film is against order and convention of any type, till I read an interview where the director, Vera Chytilová, herself refuted that. I think, I should see the film again. The other film which I tried to see, but did not complete was Sergei Parajanov 's Color of Pomegranate. Whatever I saw of it, I liked it. Its a series of set pieces, more controlled and less populated than a Fellini film, and with great folk music. This is the film I need to complete, when I have some time for myself. Due to this general uneasiness of settling down, I am not able to see the remaining De Palma ( Blow Out and Carlito's Way are still pending) and remaining Altman (no McCabe & Mrs Miller, no The Long Goodbye for me) which I promised myself last year. Still not opened account for Visconti, De Sica, Naruse, Mizoguchi and Lang. Apart from that, I have four pending series, Scenes From a Marriage, Berlin Alexanderplatz, Sátántangó and The Best of Youth. I have watched only one or two episodes of each of them. I feel like a stupid kid who likes a secondary subject, which is of no importance to grades and is generally considered waste of time. In the real world we live in, there are always more important things to do. I know, I should not crib like this, we should get two basic-bitter codes of society as soon as possible - Films are just for fun and you should grow up - but, at the same time, in our own capacity we should try to fight both of them everyday !

2 comments:

Alok said...

no problem sir... please take your time to settle down and be at peace. there is always time for these things.

btw, i recently saw some hitchcock again too. rope, psycho and the man who knew too much. the one feeling i always have with hichcock was again confirmed. he is too "perfect" and i use that word in an ambivalent way.

reg daisies the two girls are obviously agents of chaos, anarchy and destruction but other than that I don't know what to say about it!

other films I havent seen. btw, do you have berlin alexanderplatz?

anurag said...

You know that what Fellini said the same about Hitchcock that he makes films with the precision and perfection of Swiss watches, and he too meant it in a ambivalent way !

I think, Diasies is just out of my reach :)

I have Berlin Alexanderplatz, but its not a very good quality, some video transfer.