Movies

Dune or Dune Not

Chill Movies

I was talking with a woman at work and I mentioned I’d seen the first Dune in 70mm Imax.

She said, “Isn’t that pretty small?” For a split second, I had no idea what she was talking about. Then I realized she thought “70mm” was the screen size, not the film stock. I couldn’t help laughing. But once I explained she laughed along with me. I still chuckle a little thinking about it.

Double

Chill Movies

Brian De Palma on the ‘Body Double’ Ending and His New Film.

That is a good film that sometimes hits greatness.

Body Double is beloved today. But it’s also the kind of movie that nobody could make today

That’s true; I miss those kind of movies. Sydney Sweeney in The Voyeurs is as close as we can get these days. And De Palma on younger millennials and Gen Z is dead on.

What I find interesting when you see contemporary people watch these movies is they’re shocked by the nudity. They go, “Oh my God.” I’m thinking, What, are we living in the Victorian Age here? You know, they have these things on YouTube where they have two people watching a movie and reacting as they watch it? I saw two people watching the opening of Carrie. I thought they were going to have a heart attack! I was like, What has happened to this next generation? They seem to have gotten very Victorian.

I don’t think that the new Puritans realize they are living staid, bland lives at the behest of tech companies and their profits. But it’s obvious when you think about it (as De Palma also has) for 30 seconds. I wonder what if anything will shift this cultural course?

Gershwin

Chill Culture, Movies

One of the things I particularly enjoyed about My Summer of Love is that it was made in 2004, before smartphones and before social networks became ubiquitous. Thus, it feels really quite dated in a good way. The whole terms of relation are much different. Modern movies are glaring in their omissions of smartphones if they are not present while still being dominated by the social forces of their preponderance.

Also, Summer was filmed before the current deep prudishness had set in so the characters treat sex as just another part of life, like eating or breathing. No, those times weren’t better in every way (the 90s were even better in those respects), but it’s clear that everyone was just much mentally healthier then.

One of These Mornings

Chill Movies

We watched My Summer of Love earlier. Like most movies about girls/women, it’s underrated on IMDB. It’s a beautifully-shot study of the summer love affair of two girls-verging-on-women in the Midlands of the UK. The first one we meet is a lower-class, rough-around-the-edges dreamer who yearns for a better time in her life, often without quite being able to express it.

The other girl is from a posh family and seems to be sincerely looking for companionship and the solidity of a real connection after a recent tragedy has left her grieving.

But this is a deeper and more compelling work than the surface would indicate, and quite a bit darker. I’ll not say more to avoid spoilers as it’s best watching unaware. With great performances by both Emily Blunt and Natalie Press, the film never goes for the easy cliché, either in its shots or its narrative, and never is less than true to its characters and their motivations; the film moves how they would move.

Recommended.

Span

Chill Movies

Both Cailee Spaeny and Kirsten Dunst were very good in Civil War, but the movie itself was meh. It didn’t know what it wanted to say or to be; it committed to nothing. There is a lot of noise and Sturm und Drang but it just has no thesis. At the same time, it’s not observant nor perspicacious enough to be a slice of life (or of death) film, either.

It just was not a good film despite the combat portions being pretty well-done. I wish it had been attempting to say something, anything, to have some history or future or meaning. Not every movie needs that, of course. But this one did.

Not recommended, unless you’re a particular fan of Cailee or Kirsten or both.