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Post by Fox in the Snow on May 2, 2017 23:43:43 GMT
Just a few of the top of my head Any Tarkovsky ( Solaris has already been mentioned) Mizoguchi, particularly Ugetsu and SanshoMost Wong Kar-Wai ( In the Mood For Love has already been mentioned), particularly Ashes of Time, Happy Together, 2046Antonioni, though he may be too “rigid”, definitely some of the sequences in The Red Desert though Hou Hsiao-Hsien’s The Assassin, Kitano’s Dolls and Refn's Valhalla RisingHaven't seen all of these, Fox, though from what I read about them they seem like they would indeed qualify. And I've only seen Tarkovsky's ANDREI RUBLEV, but I'd certainly add it. As for Antonioni, I'm not a big fan of the films of his I've seen, but I understand why you would like to include him. I do think his films have a poetic quality to them, just not one that I particularly appreciate. Mizoguchi for sure belongs here. And I need to catch up on the others (I say that again and again, but somehow doubt that I'll get ever get it done). Thanks for the post, and for introducing me to new titles and filmmakers.Tarkovsky’s probably the first person who comes to mind when I think of cinema “poetry”, truly stunning dreamlike images and “flow” to his narratives. Antonioni is definitely divisive but I’m a big fan of his work, particularly the run from L’Avventura to The Red Desert. I does get very hard to keep up with all the great films past and current, I have the same problem of an ever growing watchlist. The Assassin is a beautifully opaque (near-impenetrable) martial arts film, very light on action, heavy on lush imagery "The Assassin" trailerValhalla Rsing is an (at times) ultra-violent, trippy viking film with plenty of Malick-ian visual flourishes "Valhalla Rising" trailer |
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Post by gadolinium on May 4, 2017 19:52:09 GMT
Marketa Lazarová (1967).
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Post by telegonus on May 5, 2017 7:15:24 GMT
If I can be so bold, and to expand a bit on the topic of this thread, as to substitute poetic for the usual "pictorial" or "painterly" to describe many of John Ford's films I think many if not most quality. Among the better known: The Informer, The Prisoner Of Shark Island, Drums Along The Mohawk, The Grapes Of Wrath, They Were Expendable, The Fugitive and many of Ford's westerns as well, such as Stagecoach, My Darling Clementine, She Wore A Yellow Ribbon and The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance.
More poetic westerns: Raoul Walsh's early talkie The Big Trail (in a word, awesome), and Howard Hawks' rousing and rip-roaring Red River,--a joy to behold--in addition to Shane and the already mentioned High Noon and the Peckinpah films are all testaments of a sort to the aesthetic of the classic Hollywood western. The Anthony Mann series of westerns with James Stewart are also quite beautiful just to look at. I think of the all-outdoors The Naked Spur. Another western with poetic qualities, the David Miller-Kirk Douglas Lonely Are The Brave.
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Post by spiderwort on May 5, 2017 12:01:12 GMT
Beautifully said, telegonus , and I agree completely. As for John Ford, whom generally I consider to be one of the giants of "poetic" films, I'd like to add How Green Was My Valley. And I'm glad you mentioned "painterly" as an aspect of this topic, for, indeed, I would include that as part of a film's poetry. I think that's why I've so often mentioned the "canvas" the filmmaker uses in making a film. I'd just add that these painterly, pictorial, poetic elements are exquisite and beautiful in and of themselves, of course, but are made far more meaningful when in the service of the characters and the narrative, as they are in all the films you mentioned. In other words, they convey both style and substance. Thank you for your thoughtful comments. Btw, glad to see your mention of Lonely Are the Brave. |
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Post by telegonus on May 5, 2017 17:36:26 GMT
Thanks, Spiderwort. I wonder if there's a "verbal" equivalent of "painterly" other than, obviously, a film consisted of verse, an adaptation of Shakespeare. The films of Joseph Mankiewicz and Billy Wilder are wonderful verbally, but poetic? It's the same with George Cukor.
Early films of Mankiewicz that show some visual elegance,--Dragonwyck, The Ghost & Mrs Muir--not much else. Maybe Manny Farber was right when he wrote that Mankiewicz's movies tend to come out of the mouths of his characters rather than "happen on screen". Yet there's a dark beauty at work in Suddenly, Last Summer, and the scenes of a character running from street urchins in the end, narrated though they may be, are visually haunting all the same.
Billy Wilder's films have their moments, too, even as they often have a nearly "clinical" quality at times. I dearly love Double Indemnity, yet I don't find it poetic. There are marvelous scenes in many Wilder films, and they have great power, notably Sunset Blvd and Some Like It Hot. George Cukor showed some visual flair even early on, yet he mostly "served the material". When the material called for atmospheric touches, as with A Woman's Face and Keeper Of The Flame he was up to it.
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Post by telegonus on May 6, 2017 7:17:14 GMT
Thanks, Spiderwort. I wonder if there's a "verbal" equivalent of "painterly" other than, obviously, a film consisted of verse, an adaptation of Shakespeare. I was struggling with this very idea in my last response to you, telegonus . I can't find anything that works, really, which is why I suppose I opt for the more inclusive term of "poetic," which, for me at least, can be both visual and verbal.
Poetic, painterly, whatever you want to call it - film is a visual art that is the product of everything integrated into it, and it carries the inspiration of every collaborator. That's what makes the difference - when the artists can let go and let the mystery work through them to achieve transcendence. A lot of that depends upon the creative personas of those involved. Some have a more "poetic" bent; others do not. Malick and Wilder do not have the same sensibilities; nor do Wyler and Bergman.
Anyway, I wish I had a good word for it, but I don't, really. Just visual art and transcendence. But that's a mouthful that's pretty hard to grasp.
Some directors do seem to have the poetic flair. I think that Wyler showed some now and again. There are moments in Dead End, Jezebel, Wuthering Heights and even The Letter that strike me as poetic.
I neglected to mention a favorite and very poetic film,--in all senses of that word-- A Taste Of Honey. Rita Tushingham's performance alone gives it wings. It's typical of a lot of dare to be different films of its era as it establishes a kind of child's eye (and ear) ambiance and never completely letting it go.
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Post by Jillian on May 6, 2017 7:30:41 GMT
I am not sure if these fall ino that category at all? However, these came to mind;
The Bridges of Madison County
The Artist
In A Better World
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Post by tucotherat on May 8, 2017 4:33:37 GMT
The Good The Bad And The Ugly Lawrence Of Arabia Dersu Uzala |
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Post by bonerxmas on May 8, 2017 4:35:10 GMT
The Good The Bad And The Ugly Lawrence Of Arabia Dersu Uzala those were your high school nicknames |
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Post by telegonus on May 8, 2017 18:54:44 GMT
There's poetry in them that horrors (or some of them anyway):
The Abominable Snowman Of The Himalayas is an early black and white Hammer film, filmed in England, it beautifully suggests the mountainous terrain of the Far East, features a beautiful performance from Peter Cushing (yes, beautiful!) and manages to be neither a pure horror nor sci-fi, of the usual sort, in its suggestions of the Unknown.
Roman Polanski's Swingin' London Sixties horror, Repulsion, manages to be poetic and frightening at the same time, draws the viewer in its weirdly woozy poetic aspects that at times suggests the same director's Rosemary's Baby of a few years later. It's downright hypnotic in drawing the viewer into the world of a young woman going mad...
Non-horror, same director: Knife In The Water. A masterpiece of ambiguity, filmed in Polanski's native Poland, it's both minimalist, as to its prosaic setting and visual drabness, and at the same time extremely complex psychologically. There's a kind of Bergmanesque stark lyricism in it that can make some of us wish that Polanski had "remained European", though this was admittedly not in his best interests personally.
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Post by manfromplanetx on Jun 3, 2017 4:52:02 GMT
Master Japanese filmmaker
Kaneto Shindô revived his own production company which was close to bankruptcy with his 1960 film Hadaka no shima , The Naked Island . The success of the film also brought him international recognition, having been sold in sixty-one countries.
A poetic film with very little dialogue in fact none in the first 38 minutes, it tells the tale of a small family, a husband and wife and two sons, struggling to get by on a tiny island in the Seto Inland Sea, over the course of one year.
The harsh & daily routines are carried out by impassive characters, these rituals are dramatized with extended silences and ambient sound. Their austere existence & silent suffering however is compelling and profoundly expressive, an artistic engaging film overflowing with poetic naturalness.
Shindô described the film as... "a cinematic poem to try and capture the life of human beings struggling like ants against the forces of nature".
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Post by Fox in the Snow on Jun 3, 2017 13:02:53 GMT
Master Japanese filmmaker Kaneto Shindô revived his own production company which was close to bankruptcy with his 1960 film Hadaka no shima , The Naked Island . The success of the film also brought him international recognition, having been sold in sixty-one countries. A poetic film with very little dialogue in fact none in the first 38 minutes, it tells the tale of a small family, a husband and wife and two sons, struggling to get by on a tiny island in the Seto Inland Sea, over the course of one year. The harsh & daily routines are carried out by impassive characters, these rituals are dramatized with extended silences and ambient sound. Their austere existence & silent suffering however is compelling and profoundly expressive, an artistic engaging film overflowing with poetic naturalness. Shindô described the film as... "a cinematic poem to try and capture the life of human beings struggling like ants against the forces of nature". Will hopefully be watching that one very soon. Plenty of visual poetry in the two films I have seen from him already, Onibaba and Kuroneko. |
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Post by Fox in the Snow on Jun 3, 2017 13:13:35 GMT
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Post by petrolino on Jun 4, 2017 2:08:09 GMT
I love the poetic realists of the 1930s; honestly, I think French cinema at its best has a rhythm and poetry like no other. "In spite of having reservations about sound film, no French director (and very few others elsewhere) got off to a better start in the new medium than Rene Clair. Sous les toits de Paris (Under the Roofs of Paris) relies little on spoken dialogue or plot complications. Its lyrical homage to a Paris that was rapidly disappearing now seems like an endearing time capsule and a gift to unreconstructed Romantics—a lilting miracle floating buoyantly, like Clair’s crane shots, above the fray of life. Much of the film’s beauty can be credited to Clair’s choice of collaborators. Cinematographer Georges Périnal (1895–1965) had worked with Marcel L’Herbier and Jean Cocteau before filming Clair’s early talkies. Then, like Clair, he went to Britain in the 1930s to work for Alexander Korda’s London Films, making several gorgeous movies in Technicolor. Périnal’s late work included Charles Chaplin’s A King in New York and Otto Preminger’s Bonjour Tristesse."
- Charles Silver, The Museum Of Modern Art
Some favourites : 'L'Atalante' (1934 - Jean Vigo) 'Pepe Le Moko' (1937 - Julien Duvivier) 'Hotel Du Nord' (1938 - Marcel Carne) 'La Bete Humaine' (1938 - Jean Renoir) |
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Post by Dr. Miles Bennell on Jun 4, 2017 2:39:56 GMT
Surely, the films of Karel Zeman.
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Post by teleadm on Jun 8, 2017 20:18:25 GMT
Surely, the films of Karel Zeman. That was fun, a couple of days ago I was trying to remember a Jules Verne movie I had seen long long ago, and thanks to you mentioning Zeman I finally could find out which one it was. Vynález zkázy/The Fabulous World of Jules Verne 1958, all movie frames are just like the etchings in the Jules Verne books I read as a kid. |
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Post by hi224 on Oct 21, 2018 2:07:28 GMT
Ran.
Wild Strawberries
In Bruges
Memento
Memories of mURDER
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Post by hi224 on Oct 21, 2018 2:20:24 GMT
Tree Of Life.
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Post by BATouttaheck on Oct 21, 2018 2:32:55 GMT
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Post by Fox in the Snow on Oct 21, 2018 7:26:49 GMT
Malick definitely. I finally saw Knight of Cups and though it comes off as almost a Malick pastiche, I still really enjoyed it. Glad he's returning to a period setting for his next one though. |
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