Movies

Appleseed (1988) A classic of anime. If you like this sort of thing, you really ought to read the manga - this is made a bit generic by its translation to cel animation, while the original art has a liveliness and intensity that is truly memorable. Nevertheless, the story is complex and intelligent, the settings and concepts are imaginative. Film - 6/10; Manga - 10/10

Movies

I haven't been keeping up with my viewing here lately because I've been spending more time reading tutorials and manuals online so I just get kind of tired of words on a screen, but I will try to catch up here. I got a set of Golden Age of Televison live broadcasts because Donna wanted to see the original version of Marty, which we watched, and we also watched The Comedian starring Mickey Rooney and Edmond O'Brien. They were interesting to see, and very impressive in their execution, but didn't leave us thirsting for more so I returned it to the library. Donna like Marty more than I did.

We also watched Night and the City (1950) - another of Jules Dassin's unique stories. Richard Widmark is a frenzied two-bit hustler who thinks he's finally found his big thing. All-around excellent production and well worth seeing. 9/10

On my own I have seen:

Los Cronocrimenes (Timecrimes) 2007 - a tense, complicated and jarring time travel thriller. More of a feel-bad movie than I usually care for but well presented and thought out. I sure wouldn't do what that guy did - listen, if you start jumping back in time don't go trying to "fix" things. That's where they always go wrong. 7/10

Moon Zero Two (1969) Hammer studios' space crime adventure. I saw part of it on TV when I was a teenager and now I have finally seen it all. Lots of nightclub scenes which to me are vital to any SF film. Full-size moon buses on huge soundstage sets, entertaining and thoughtful set and costume design, adequate acting and story. Don't kill yourself trying to see it, but it's okay for a slow evening. 6/10

Also been watching a lot of old Russian cartoons because they do a lot of cutout animation, as well as trying to find extremely crude and simple animation to see just how little one can get away with for character movement without becoming too boring to watch - Mel-O-Toons are right on the border, Mr. Piper cartoons and Clutch Cargo/Captain Fathom are way over the line. That's what all the online study has been for - learning animation.

Recent Viewing

Whisky (2004) Watched with Donna. The first Uruguayan film I have seen, the directors cite Kaurismaki as an influence in the closing credits, and it shows - maybe a little too much. The taciturn owner of a sock factory (a tiny shop with three employees) and his shop foreman must pretend to be married while his brother, also a sock factory owner, visits from Brazil. This is the kind of movie in which nothing is explained, there is very little dialog and no establishing shots to show the environment or locales - but that's not bad really. I hesitate to use the word intimate, but it is about the people and learning to see what they are inside when they show little on the outside. You aren't going to learn much about Uruguay from this but it is a comedy insofar as it provides a few quiet chuckles, and is a pretty good movie about people which you may not forget right away. 8/10

Cherry 2000 (1987) [TV] Melanie Griffith sleepwalks her way through this scifi action movie. They seem to have had some money to spend on sets, and deserve credit for the Boulder Dam locations, but mostly it's just go into the deadly zone to find the fabulous object, have gunfights and blow stuff up in the old quarry. Griffith needed a far better movie than this to bring out her subtle qualities. 4/10

Beast In Space (1980) Directed by Alfonso Brescia a.k.a. Al Bradley. The last of his series of five SF films and by far the lousiest. It uses the same sets, props, costumes and effects sequences as the rest, but this is the porno movie of the series and seems as if he had just given up trying. It's all equally dreary and uninteresting, whether they are walking around in a cave or crummy little hallway set, or squirming around kissing each other on the chest and leg. You know that I despise superlatives like "worst ever" as more revealing of the user's ignorance than their knowledge, but in this case it leaves me wondering how to adequately convey the place of these five movies, and this last one, in the history of cinema. I can only say that as a combined work it is unique. This should only be seen after having endured the other four, but preferably not at all. 1/10

Recent Viewing

White Sun of the Desert (1970) A spaghetti western with an unlikely hero holed up in the old mission with half a dozen women, armed with a machine gun and a box of dynamite against a bandit army. Except the hero is a Red Army soldier just trying to get home, the old mission is a ruined mosque on the shore of the Caspian Sea, and the women are the harem of the bandit chief. All treated with the usual combination of wit and tragedy - good clean fun. 8/10

Mafioso (1962) Watched with Donna. Meticulous factory supervisor revisits his folksy home town in Sicily and learns the true meaning of family. Sicilian family. Even though you know from the beginning that he is sure to end up in a terrible situation before the end of the story, it is relentlessly amusing throughout. Convincingly detailed with sunscorched cobbled streets and huge platters of amazing food. Extremely entertaining, surprising in its developments and highly rewarding overall. 10/10

Rusty Knife (1958) Acceptable Japanese noir has its moments - including a chase scene in huge trucks and an almost hilariously overacted gangster suicide. Nothing really spectacular, but a good workmanlike job. A very young Jo Shishido doesn't survive long. 6/10

Movies

Twice Upon a Time (1983) Apparently there is a long story about the fate of this animated oddity, but it is obvious from the first moment that it was simply too odd, too visually inventive and conceptually skewed to provide the monetary return which denotes success under the lash of capitalism. (My copy is from a vhs of the unbowdlerized original edition.) It is innovative in style and technique, primarily cutout animation, with additions of live action and video, teaches no lesson and has no moral other than that happy dreams are better than nightmares. It is silly, witty, and fun, and made me boggle with admiration at the outstanding and unique visual style. Marshall Efron voices the villain. 9/10

Gardening Advice

This is the time of year when big tubs of fresh chickpeas show up at our local supermarket. They are crunchy, nutty and green, each rattling in its own stiff wooly bubble. At almost $4 a pound a cheapskate like me begins to think of growing them for free. The first year I tried it nothing came up, so the next year I sprouted them for a few days and was rewarded with a thicket of short hardy plants. Their stems are thick and square, standing straight up - the blooms are white with a purple center it's almost black, a target the bees love. The best surprise was that the fuzzy pods coat their hairs with a sour/salty exudation you can lick off your fingers, making them nature's self-salting snack treat. If you have a couple of square feet of garden to spare, try it. I'm sprouting mine now and in a couple of days will plant them. I just use the same kind I cook - they aren't hybridized into some kind of infertile abomination like amaranth and some other grain crops are.

Movies

Gog (1953) Offbeat "mad machines" story. Not always exciting but visually entrancing from the beauty of the color and set/costume design. I haven't looked it up but it was obviously made in 3D from the way things keep getting pointed at the camera. Interesting to see William Schallert getting crushed by a rampaging robot, and the chrome double-rotor helicopter is fabulous. 6/10