Music in the Making: Highlights from the 2008 Melbourne International Film Festival
“The surprise musical number can represent a facile avoidance of complexity, a moment of true strangeness, or a way of harmonizing existing, underlying themes.”
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“The surprise musical number can represent a facile avoidance of complexity, a moment of true strangeness, or a way of harmonizing existing, underlying themes.”
“Suddenly my senses are all incredibly acute … I’m different, more alive, stronger … “
“When talking to others, what needs to be articulated?”
“She is both sentimental and shameless.”
“Each stranger is a figure of seemingly infinite potential, pinned down to a changing series of points.” Given that the new director of the Melbourne International Film Festival, Richard Moore,[…]
“Even the least imaginative people are incredulous about aging: surely this isn’t the only story, the only body I get to inhabit.” To start off, Hong Kong films may not[…]
“Lazarus doesn’t pathologize the locked-in gaze, he lets us feel it.” In a pornographic film, what’s gratuitous is not sex but complexity and involvement. An erotic film can confuse us[…]
“The Coppola ideal is a young girl trapped in fustiness: she can be an object of voyeurism without a trace of lewdness, and remain spiritually intact even when accessorized.” Sofia[…]
Actors & Personalities · Asian
“The women of To’s world are not just endearingly kooky, but often unacceptably bizarre and amoral in their excited reactions to events.” Five years ago, I was starting to think[…]
“People are constantly falling back on their beds — but always in languor, never in passion . . .” It’s difficult not to be grateful to a film that introduces you to six or[…]
African American · Essays · Genres · Lists · Movies
“It’s independent thinking without the protection of an ‘indie’ label.” While hosting the Academy Awards in 2005, Chris Rock made the following claim: black films don’t have real names. “Barbershop?[…]
What is the best way of placing a body? The opening scenes of The River (1997) are spent trying to make a body move and work in a realistic way. A film[…]
Actors & Personalities · Reviews
“Speaking of impurity: what was Rita Hayworth’s image supposed to be in the ’40s?” What did we use to think of other countries? The question occurred to me while watching[…]
“In films these days, people are hardly ever ‘taken’ by others — they don’t strike up sudden affinities, or become voluptuously intrigued by enemies.” In the 1940s, it was quite[…]
Turning “the male gaze” on men It’s true that seeing Rock Hudson surrounded by able-bodied women is fun. In Man’s Favorite Sport? (1964) he’s blocked — trapped in a “stoic”[…]
The screwball comedy’s back, and Weaver’s got it Sex is not a tap, we’re told. Real sensuality is something that flows, right? It’s effortless, and you exude it — you[…]
“Who doesn’t want to be rescued by their narrator?” Sometimes a film’s camera takes you on one track, while its music sends you on another, wider one: it offers you[…]
“There’s always been an acute mystery attached to the body . . .” Since Flirting with Disaster starts with Patricia Arquette lying in bed for two minutes, we think we[…]
“Where do alchemy and acting meet?” Perhaps the definition of a great screwball comedy is that it is an outstandingly funny film for which no real script is conceivable. For[…]
“My sound is the absence of me.” – Elmore Leonard The curious thing about Elmore Leonard is that while his books move fast, the films that capture his tone seem[…]