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AlmostAGhost

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Posts posted by AlmostAGhost

  1. Posted

    Here's mine

    1. 2001 (5 stars)
    2. Lord Of The Rings (5)
    3. Double Indemnity (5)
    4. The Wizard Of Oz (5)
    5. Duck Soup (5)
    6. Taxi Driver (5)
    7. All About Eve (4.5)
    8. Psycho (4.5)
    9. The Shawshank Redemption (4)
    10. The General (4)
    11. Ben-Hur (4)
    12. Citizen Kane (4)
    13. Raiders of the Lost Ark (4)
    14. The Sixth Sense (4)
    15. High Noon (4)
    16.  E.T. (3.5)
    17. King Kong (3.5)
    18. African Queen (3.5)
    19. Platoon (3.5)
    20. Bonnie and Clyde (3.5)
    21. The French Connection (3.5)
    22. Singin' In The Rain (3)
    23. Apocalypse Now (3)
    24. Titanic (3)
    25. Swing Time (2.5) 

    • Like 3

  2. Posted

    Yea serious... how is Reddit getting a mention over us?

    I don't mind the FB group, but as I've said, they talk about movies in general (someone once was like 'what's your favorite World War I movie' which... who cares or has one?  But still had a million replies.).  I prefer talking about these specific 100.

    Also I mainly know your guys' Letterboxd lists, and my own, but it feels like Paul AND Amy's list was pretty different from ours, which was interesting.

    • Like 3

  3. Posted

    Yea this new AG is problems.  We'll see what happens: I think Schiff in charge of Intelligence Committee is a big help. 

    At least we have the House to act as a check now in the government.  I've been a bit cynical since Trump got to appoint terrible Supreme Court justices, feeling like nothing matters anymore. I feel a bit of hope coming back...

    • Like 2

  4. Posted

    Yea for sure. Flipping the Senate back will take a few more elections to happen, so that one's a more patient and long-term form of activism.  Some of our big, most attention-grabbing races lost (or are still being contested), but looking past those it was a pretty great run yesterday. Fired me up for sure!  

    • Like 1

  8. Posted

    There's not as many Duck Soup gifs on twitter as I thought, since the Marx Bros. are perfect for such things.  There is a lot from the mirror scene though!  

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  12. Posted

    Yea really, coming in I had the same ideas as Grudlian. I only know Bette from Wind Beneath My Wings, Hocus Pocus, and, I guess, twitter.  Because of that, I was not expecting this to be a gritty look at the rock and roll lifestyle, with her singing blues and being all raw.  I knew her mostly as pop ballad mainstream type!  But that said, tt definitely surpassed all my expectations and I liked it a lot.

    I really liked how alive the movie felt too... there was always a lot of things going on in the background (scenic views, crowds, waving flags, etc.).  It never felt like a movie to me, which made it all the more harrowing.  

    • Like 6

  17. Posted

    It is a weird genre for this sort of debate.  Like I said early, I love Duck Soup but I don't know how high it'd be on my personal fave list.  Hell, I'd rather watch UHF.  And I don't think that should be anywhere near the AFI list.  But I do think Duck Soup should.  So who knows what's going on here?  I want to square it.

    One thing I was trying not to do though is diminish comedy. Duck Soup is doing comedy and that's it. That to me should be enough for consideration. Do we demand Hitchcock be more romantic?  Scorsese be more funny?  Why does Duck Soup need more pathos?  Comedy should be valid on its own too.  That's where Duck Soup gets me.

    • Like 4

  18. Posted

    I was trying real hard to not just be "I like it and it makes me laugh" but I guess I'll keep thinking about it some more. 

    Actually our convo has led to me deciding that on this off-week, I'm going to watch a bunch of classic comedies.  Because I think that there is something objective to them being great.  I'm just not sure what that is...

    • Like 2

  19. Posted

    Bringing Up Baby is definitely a comedy.  It's weird af too, I look forward to what you all think. It definitely has a story, but it's so bizarre to me, I can't get my head around it.  Haha. I hope we come up on that one soon.

  20. Posted

    19 minutes ago, Cameron H. said:

    but for some reason this one gets in because of clever wordplay

    As one of the only ones defending Duck Soup here, I'm not being very clear I guess.

  21. Posted

    19 minutes ago, tomspanks said:

    But Conan’s show has a set format each night: monologue, banter, interview, skit, musical guest (not necessarily in that order every night). Each self contained segment works by itself.  I don’t think Duck Soup worked for me because the interesting bits were sort of sprinkled throughout the movie like separate skits.  Taken alone, the mirror gag is amazing. But did it move the story along? I don’t know. And I don’t even know if story telling is important in a Marx Bros movie.  The song and dance numbers didn’t help either. 

    I hear you though about Conan’s show.  I grew up watching it too. I still remember staying up late to watch his debut episode and I remember thinking, this is the most nervous person I’ve ever seen on tv. But you’re right, there was a definite Marx Bros-quality about his schtick that drew me in. So if Conan’s show exists because of Duck Soup, then thank goodness for Duck Soup!

    Sure, but if we want to go that route, we can find forms in Marx Brothers movies too.  They do play the same characters more or less, every time.  They're usually up against some sort of power figure/power structure.  Duck Soup loses a few of the norms of their earlier vaudeville-ier movies (romances, songs, etc.), but there's still some structure.  The story is nonsense, sure, but it's not pure disconnected bits.   

    Conan's point though was that they focused solely on comedy. Nobody in here is doing it, Paul & Amy did a little at the end of the show, but focusing on the political angles of Duck Soup misses the point.  Mussolini missed the point, haha.  Anyway, that's what I believe Conan meant.  Conan out of nowhere could have Frankenstein wander out and be weird, and it was hilarious.  Harpo could end up in someone's bathtub for no reason in the same way.

    • Like 2

  22. Posted

    Duck Soup (and all the Marx Bros films up to it) led the development of how to tell jokes from a filmmaking perspective.  Prior to this, we had Buster Keaton and Charlie Chaplin, who were obviously brilliant but mostly silent.  Even in the first Marx movies, they were sort of just recreating a stage experience.  But Duck Soup advanced that.  In 1933, film had just advanced past silent, and they're learning on the fly how to make comedies and be funny on this new medium of non-silent film. 

    So think the visual things like... how they introduce Groucho or Harpo into the film, how they surprise with the tattoo close-up, shooting the mirror scene, on and on.  Telling comedy via film was not done like this before Duck Soup.  That's where the landmark status lies.  You call that stuff 'basic' and maybe so, but the bases have to come from somewhere.

    It's like pre-Beatles, post-Beatles.  They defined convention by defying it.

    • Like 2

  24. Posted

    What I keep coming back to as I think about Duck Soup is something Conan said about it being "comedy just for comedy's sake." This was always why I liked Conan's show so much (I grew up on his show, it was huge for me). And it's what I like most about Duck Soup. But Duck Soup is jokes. Funny jokes. Slapstick jokes. Wordplay jokes. Visual film jokes.  Mean finger-pointing jokes. Self-deprecatory jokes.  Vaudeville, stand-up, situational, improv, musical.  You name the type of comedy, they did it and did it better than nearly everyone.  It's unbound to logic or story, which sure, is weird and takes getting used to, but pulling that off is WHY this should be on the list, imo. 

    I wouldn't even say it's my favorite comedy, or even top-10, probably due to it just being old; but I think this is such an impressive task to make work, it should be there.  There's no Airplane! without it, nor Eddie Murphy's 'too cool for the surroundings' persona, nor Monty Python's punchline-less madness, etc.: all these things we idolize today stem straight from these insane Marx Bros. movies.

    • Like 5

  25. Posted

    I dunno, I guess. I do take it as us being dropped straight into this world. And while you can see it as characters telling us what will happen, we also have NO idea who Rufus T. Firefly is when they are saying these things. So it's not really that expository. If anything, calling him a 'progressive fearless leader' is a bit of a misdirect, not any actual exposition.

    Personally I'd have liked a fuller, stronger opening, something to set up why/how Teasdale is so adamant for him. (The love bit may have come later in the film, not sure.) But I take Conan's point, it's a strange and flippant intro, and in its own way, brave. But perhaps it simply relies on viewers knowing who Groucho and his persona are (perhaps that's fair, and everyone watching in 1933 did).

    I only mentioned the minute because I wanted to note: it's real quick, doesn't say much, and then they get straight to Marx Brothers lunacy.

    • Like 1
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