Foreign Films

laprimamirala wrote:

I wouldn't recommend getting lit to watch one...you might miss something!

Ooo...I remember another one...a Russian silent, The Odessa Steps. That was using a lot of new camera angles, lighting, etc. for 1916 or so!

I never heard of that one LP. But there's another russian movie coming to my mind. Ever heard of Battleship Potemkin? That one is pretty famous i think.

Speaking of Russian movies, if you like EIGHT HOUR movies, War and Peace is supposed to be good. It better be - it's the most expensive movie ever produced.

Oh, don't worry about me being drunk for the movie. I don't drink much at all. In fact, I haven't had any alcohol since December 24.

Wait, wait. You are right. It IS Potemkin. It's the Odessa Steps SEQUENCE that we were studying in graduate school! (ugh, see how far that got me in life?)

Great opening sequence of maggot-infested meat! Just for you weak of heart!

swiss_tiger wrote:

btw: forget Switzerland when it comes down to movies.... we have great chocolate, mountains, snow, very very nice people , but no good movie. :lol:

That isn't completely true

Reise der Hoffnung (Journey of Hope) [1990] and La Diagonale du fou (Dangerous Moves) [1984] both won the Academy Award for best foreign picture. Have you seen these?

Oh, Marie-Louise (1945) won the Academy Award for best screenplay. It competed against American films so that's impressive.

mmmm could go for some chocolate right about now!

Back to silent films...

If you go to Charlie Chaplin's wikipedia page there are 3 clips from The Bond you can watch. Those scenes appear to make sense although I can't imagine how those 3 clips could form a movie. Are those clips typical of a silent film?

Also, by silent are they completely silent or just no dialogue? The ones on wikipedia have this like static in the background but if there's no sound of any sort why don't they just mute it completely? Surely that feedback doesn't add anything.

The clips can be seen here

WAIT...nevermind. The Bond isn't a real film - it's just trying to sell Liberty Bonds. It's only a 5 minute "film".

catbox_9 wrote:

swiss_tiger wrote:

btw: forget Switzerland when it comes down to movies.... we have great chocolate, mountains, snow, very very nice people , but no good movie. :lol:

That isn't completely true

Reise der Hoffnung (Journey of Hope) [1990] and La Diagonale du fou (Dangerous Moves) [1984] both won the Academy Award for best foreign picture. Have you seen these?

Oh, Marie-Louise (1945) won the Academy Award for best screenplay. It competed against American films so that's impressive.

No i haven't seen them.
I know the director of "Reise der Hoffnung" Xavier Koller. I think i have seen another movie he made. Journey of Hope really sounds interesting. Have to check that one out.

The director of the next James Bond movie, Kite runner, Stranger than fiction and some other famous movies Marc Forster is from Switzerland.

Usually you will hear some sort of music track on the ones that are released for theater and classroom use. In the actual day, the theater usually would employ an organist or piano player (hence the term "theatre organ") to provide live running accompianament (sp?) for the movie.

catbox_9 wrote:

Back to silent films...

If you go to Charlie Chaplin's wikipedia page there are 3 clips from The Bond you can watch. Those scenes appear to make sense although I can't imagine how those 3 clips could form a movie. Are those clips typical of a silent film?

Also, by silent are they completely silent or just no dialogue? The ones on wikipedia have this like static in the background but if there's no sound of any sort why don't they just mute it completely? Surely that feedback doesn't add anything.

The clips can be seen here

WAIT...nevermind. The Bond isn't a real film - it's just trying to sell Liberty Bonds. It's only a 5 minute "film".

I checked the Chaplin movie on youbue. Thats quite typical for a silent movie.
I got you another one from youtube. A sample of the movie "Cabinet of Dr. Caligari".



As far as i know there is just music in the background in silent movies. There is just no dialogue. The reason for that is (as far as i know) that in the beginning, there was a piano player in the theater playing live while the movie was running. That's what i call a hard job!
I guess the second step of the silent movie evolution was to have a soundtrack for the movie they recorded after the film was finished.

Based on that clip I guess I get what these are about. That wasn't too confusing.

I need to see Metropolis now

I saw Metropolis quite some time ago. I think i'll have to watche this again. I can remember that i really liked that one.

I had a good laugh at the shot of all the guys getting horny but the rest of it was excellent....

I bought M last night from Overstock. I'll watch that as soon as I get a chance.

I also bought a Bogart and Bacall box set that comes with 4 DVDs. Bacall is supposed to be a good film nor actress and Bogart has been good in everything I've seen so we'll see.

Boggy is one of the "all time" best actors.

GoGetEmTigers wrote:

Boggy is one of the "all time" best actors.

American Film Institute has him #1. The worst I've seen him was in Sabrina and even there he was decent.

Also good in The African Queen...

laprimamirala wrote:

Also good in The African Queen...

I think that is one of his best.

GoGetEmTigers wrote:

laprimamirala wrote:

Also good in The African Queen...

I think that is one of his best.

I liked it a lot - it got an 85 from me which is pretty good.

I need to see more of her (Katharine Hepburn) I think. Surely she's got more than 1 good film

Guess Who's Coming to Dinner (1967)

Won 2 Oscars. Another 6 wins & 20 nominations

Spencer Tracy as Matt Drayton

Sidney Poitier as Dr. John Wade Prentice

Katharine Hepburn as Christina Drayton

--------------------------------------------

On Golden Pond (1981)

Won 3 Oscars. Another 9 wins & 21 nominations

Katharine Hepburn as Ethel Thayer

Henry Fonda as Norman Thayer Jr.

Jane Fonda as Chelsea Thayer Wayne

I loved this one! It shows her great talent in her later years.

I was thinking Guess Who's Coming To Dinner and/or Morning Glory (1933). I don't know much about the latter (I don't like to read much in the way of plot summaries before viewing something - it's more of a mystery that way ) but she won an Oscar for it.

Don't forget Woman of the Year, Pat and Mike, and Desk Set.

So that's 6 of her films to check out :haha:

She was nominated for best actress just 12 times so she must have at least a few good movies. 1 down 11 to go

On another note, how'd we get to discussing her in a foreign films thread

GoGetEmTigers wrote:

--------------------------------------------

On Golden Pond (1981)

Won 3 Oscars. Another 9 wins & 21 nominations

Katharine Hepburn as Ethel Thayer

Henry Fonda as Norman Thayer Jr.

Jane Fonda as Chelsea Thayer Wayne

I loved this one! It shows her great talent in her later years.

My parents saw this movie on their first date...

bobrob2004 wrote:

My parents saw this movie on their first date...

I don't know what my parents did for theirs. I don't even think they know.

this is a fun discovery for you!

I got a free Amazon gift card from this one website today for $82 and bought some stuff including two movies (one of which is foreign), a video game, and a baseball book (Bill James' Whatever Happened to the Hall of Fame):

Citizen Kane two disc set including The Battle for Citizen Kane
AND...
Metropolis

My wishlist has the following foreign films:
Nosferatu
The Battleship Potemkin
The Birth of a Nation
Les Diaboliques (or Diabolique)

The first three are all silent. I'm going to watch Metropolis and The Battleship Potemkin for sure. If I like either one I'll try more silent films. If not I'll go to Diabolique which is supposed to be Hitchcock-like and contain some sort of fancy plot twist - it even came with an anti-spoiler message warning people not to discuss the plot with others who hadn't seen it.

wish I could borrow most of those from you!

Oh yeah, good news for people wanting me to watch silent films...
while researching The Battleship Potemkin on wikipedia I noticed an external link that said watch this online at google video (or something) so I started watching. The picture quality is absolutely awful, BUT I was following along nicely. I only watched 10 minutes because I don't want to spoil it for when I see it on DVD at some point but still - it made sense

My favorite line in the first 10 min. was "they aren't worms...they're maggots. Just wash them off with brime" :puke2: :puke2: :puke2: