1FF Film Club - REVENGE

[Son of Cod]

We're implementing a no-review-no-theme/film-nomination-next-time policy, right?

 

[Vanni]

Nothing special and I agree with SOC - it's not a classic. Actually it's another one of those movies who have a very good score (8.1) on IMDB just because they're a non-hollywood film, therefore by definition they have to be good. Don't get me wrong, I've watched a lot of foreign movies and some of them are excellent, much better than the usual hollywood fare, but I have found that most are just average movies highly rated by those who want to look smart.

Since I'm not in this movie club I won't comment on the movie itself, except to say that even though I don't think it's one of the greats, it's not a waste of time either and it's a pretty enjoyable affair. Just not a classic. 6.5/10.

 

[lordofthepies]

I liked it. So very cool.

The first link I watched on didn't have subtitles but I didn't realise until the first word was spoken after 10 minutes. I then spent a very frustrating hour trying to find somewhere to watch it with subtitles. It was worth it eventually.

7.6 bags of popcorn.

 

[lordofthepies]

Nothing special and I agree with SOC - it's not a classic. Actually it's another one of those movies who have a very good score (8.1) on IMDB just because they're a non-hollywood film, therefore by definition they have to be good. Don't get me wrong, I've watched a lot of foreign movies and some of them are excellent, much better than the usual hollywood fare, but I have found that most are just average movies highly rated by those who want to look smart.

Since I'm not in this movie club I won't comment on the movie itself, except to say that even though I don't think it's one of the greats, it's not a waste of time either and it's a pretty enjoyable affair. Just not a classic. 6.5/10.

You can probably still join the club if you want to...

 

[Vanni]

You can probably still join the club if you want to...

The reason I didn't join the club in the first place was only because I was unsure if I would be able to see the nominated film in time. And sitting through some senseless action movie too, just because I would have to

 

[Son of Cod]

You can probably still join the club if you want to...

Yep Vanni, you're officially one of the most active members of the club now, especially when you discount the ones who are still trying to figure out how to use the internet.

 

[Martino Knockavelli]

Since we've had posted a provocative theory on the relationship between Hollywood hegemony and all cinema made everywhere else ever (essentially grist for the mill of charlatans looking to get laid/improve their forum q score, except for Amelie and Oldboy, which are classics tbf mate) perhaps it might be useful to examine Le Samourai from something resembling that perspective, and try and unlock the text that way.

Melville was infatuated with American cinema and culture. He drove a massive American car, went around in a 10 gallon hat, Melville wasn't even his real surname - he adopted it to style himself after Herman. He sought to articulate that obsession by making crime and noir films that were in thrall to their American contemporaries and predecessors. It seems to me that he saw those films as something like a myth system - he was fascinated by the archetypes that inhabited them, their gestures, the style and texture of the worlds. But like a lot outsiders who seek to recreate something from another culture, he ended up making something new and distinctive. The translation was not 1:1, it was more like a refraction. In trying to distill something uniquely American he created something uniquely Gallic. There was an almost Bressonian spareness and poise to all of his films, but I think it reached its zenith here and in Le Circle Rouge, and Delon was the perfect muse.

The codes and mores of the professional criminal have become an ascetic monk like lifestyle. The Production Code imposed morality of film noir has become fatalistic inevitability. But if the film is concerned with exposing something about the truth of these archetypes then Melville wasn't unaware of his authorial complicity - the film teeters on the edge of the absurd, as a portrait of immaculate, abstracted masculinity it's as ridiculous as it is cool. The poetry found in Jef's desolation is doggerel - all the looking in mirrors, the birdcage motif, the solitary flaneur apart from the streets he stalks. That the film can keep both the plates spinning is its great achievement...

 

[G.B]

that's pretty much what i was going to say ^

 

[smat]

Well the Titanic sucked!!

 

[Craig]

I have every intention of watching this sometime before the weekend. We will be moving along with the next theme though.

 

[Martino Knockavelli]

Shoulda known you would take months to watch it since it was my nomination.

 

[Craig]

I don't even know what you're on about..