ILX Film Club, The (1924-2019)

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/36/Modern_Times_poster.jpg

Modern Times, Charles Chaplin, 1936
Morbsies #239
Sight & Sound Critics #78
Sight & Sound Directors #72

only clips available on youtube, open to suggestions about where it's available to watch, apart from torrents

Criterion do a UK regioned blu-ray of Modern Times.

xpost

The proposition that American Hitchcock was superior to English Hitchcock first pushed by French critics in the 1950s? Wood's first piece of film criticism, an essay on Psycho, rejected by Penelope Houston for Sight and Sound (because Wood hadn't acknowledged that Psycho was a 'comedy') but accepted by Cahiers du Cinema.

For at least the last thirty years, certain British critics - led by Charles Barr - have argued in favour of the English films, and it's quite an industry now. A former ILXOR published a good book-length study of The Lodger a year or so ago.

That former ilxor was often pushing against the notion that Brit cinema was bad when posting here. I guess being told Godard was god when you think it's juvenalia gets old.

I am not as negative as some (though I started like that), but I am not fully sold on the glories of it either. Saying the UK channeled a lot of those energies on making often excellent TV is hardly a disaster for culture.

Well, not in the 1930's tho!

I do remember a post by the poster who shall not be named saying Hitchcock was "miles ahead of everyone else in Britain" circa The Lodger.

I wanted to re-watch Goodbye, Dragon Inn (Tsai, 2003) after it topped the mini-poll we ran a couple of months ago...and as I watched the first five mins it turned out I had never seen it lol.

What a film though. Just about perfect.

Always with Tsai in this period is to talent to assemble the right composition to convey sadness and hilarity.

Very much a film that will make you laugh and cry.

So, Modern Times then.

Definitely a big step up from City Lights I'd say, mostly appreciate it for the set design and cinematography, both of which are all-time, to the extent that it felt like The Tramp just got in the way from time to time. Once again the plot is just an excuse for a series of set pieces, which must be amazing if you are a fan of Chaplin and find him hilarious and adorable, but I have to conclude at this point that I just don't, sorry. Paulette Goddard is just wonderful though, such a modern actor, and much better than the simpering Virginia Cherrill. Doesn't have a great deal of chemistry with Chaplin, which is odd considering they married this year. The shot of them walking away together at the end is perfectly done, couldn't have imagined better.

So I'm not in love with this, but it's such a beautiful film that I don't really care.

39 steps on tptv this afternoon for the Britishers

oh no, that was the 59 version with Kenneth More

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/51/Make_Way_for_Tomorrow_%281937_poster%29.jpg

Make Way for Tomorrow, Leo McCarey, 1937
Morbsies #723

And devastating as any Ozu.

*as

Looks really good.

xyzzzz, am I wrong in remarking that you haven't seen much older Hollywood fare? (Not a dis at all, btw, just an observation).

No problem. I'd say that's correct, yes. Silents is a massive gap overall.

Only classic US mini-genre I've seen quite a lot of is noir.

it is curious that what I think of as the typical examples of the golden age of Hollywood (basically MGM musical extravaganzas) are so underrepresented in this list

fantastic film. rewatched it with my dad a while back and he loved it.

Welles was right about Make Way. Pretty sure that, outside of Only Angels Have Wings, this is my favorite golden era Hollywood movie

Saw it once ages ago, thought it was very good. Going My Way--the way it handles Barry Fitzgerald's character--is also an excellent film about getting old.

In case Eve -- sorry, Eric -- doesn't know to which Welles quote he refers:

Orson Welles said of the film, "It would make a stone cry,"

It would.

This is a good film, but I couldn’t help being frustrated by how useless the husband is and how his wife shelters him from the realities of their situation. In a way, it makes the film more potent, because we see her perspective and how she has to bear the burden of understanding the end of the relationship on her own. Still, it’s hard for me to embrace a film based around keeping someone ignorant of the truth of their prospects and fate.

Why not? The keeping up -- the shattering of -- illusions is in part what it's about. Many films have a similar theme.

It might make me heartless that I’d prefer to see the husband’s illusions broken.

Sure! But is that a reason to recoil? Sorry if I'm pressing.

I wouldn't say "recoil", just that the film didn't reach a potential level of dramatic tension; although I do feel for the wife having to protect a fool from the consequences of his actions. Maybe, in a way, it's cruel of her to allow him to keep his optimism, only for it to (presumably) be shattered, later, when he is alone?

I don't think it will be shattered, he'll keep on trying to find work, I think he knows too, deep down, but he just always tries to put a positive spin on things. Reminds me of my dad, and of me to a certain extent.

Anyway, finally watched this this evening, agreed with Orson that it's very affecting stuff, all the more so because the children aren't monsters, they're just dealing with their own shit.

It’s really close to Renoir, as Hollywood filmmaking goes

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Holiday, George Cukor, 1938
Morbsies #144

Maybe Hepburn's best early performance, close to Grant's best, period, and while the film's message is weird (i.e. we all need holidays) it's so damn un-American I'm surprised people weren't arrested.

Much prefer this to The Philadelphia Story

yep

It might be the most modern of all the screwball era comedies, in that it has a progressive message and none of the more manipulative/abrasive gender relations stuff.

It's certainly not the funniest of them. But it's so kind hearted and warm that I don't really mind that.

the kindheartedness is the key

https://archive.org/details/ld-4y-1938

it's odd how many of these films take ages to grab me but by the end I'm absolutely sold. loved Grant and Hepburn, in this, loved the leisurely pace and the way they were just fooling around, but at the same time making massive decisions that would affect their whole lives, a perfect match of feel and message. the scene with the two of them doing circus tricks in the attic, and the punch & Judy show were perfect, and the ending felt completely earned. really enjoyable hour and a half, and one I'll come back to.

I've said this before but Lew Ayres is my favorite screen alcoholic: sad, ironic, possibly gay.

yeah he was a lot more convincing here than in All Quiet On The Western Front.

Also: Julia isn't a villain. She loves her sister. You can see the sparks of their former camaraderie. No one's a villain in this picture except for Henry Daniell.

Yup, even Henry Kolker was far from being an ogre.

Anyway, here's a biggie...

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/c/c3/La_regle_du_jeu.jpg

The Rules of the Game, Jean Renoir, 1939
Morbsies #7
Sight & Sound Critics #13
Sight & Sound Directors #38

oh I've heard of this one

It's on youtube but without subtitles.

Of all the movies that regularly get called, more or less, the best of all time, Rules is the one where you just have to go "Yeah, of course it is."

I've had mediocre experiences teaching this one to college students the last five years.

I've seen it one (1) time, in my first month at film school, my script-writing tutor (this guy) showed it to us on a little TV before he let us write anything.

That was a quarter of a century ago and I remember very little