Point Blank

If you are interested in an absolutely perfect gangster picture from 1967, John Boorman's Point Blank is for you. This movie is tight, gripping, and haunting. It's filmed, in many ways, like a John Schlesinger film, and it seems to predict much of what he would do with Midnight Cowboy vis-à-vis flashback and slow motion. It's also a very obvious inspiration for Pulp Fiction, although Boorman is doing something other than Tarantino entirely. This is a real gangster picture that winds up being, fundamentally, about what it means to seek revenge, and what the ethics of killing are. The respect among the real guns is my favorite thing about this, but the ending is exquisite, and every bit of it is riveting.

Point Blank is also very violent and in surprising ways. At one point Lee Marvin actually throws a naked man off of a roof! This was, of course, while the PCA was still in power, and so this film must clearly be grouped with those films – The Killing, Bonnie and Clyde – that contributed to the end of the production code. For this we should all be grateful.

One of the coolest things this movie does is recreate the style of a film noir in color. In other words, it uses shadow and the kind of disappearing/reappearing tactics that the noir filmmakers used, even though this is a color film.

And keep a look out for the gay couple that helps Lee Marvin sneak into the apartment complex in act two.

But more than anything, Point Blank just needs to be watched as a brilliant piece of crime cinema. It's perfect.

New Favorite Movie

I feel like I wasted the whole day. Mostly because I actually did waste the whole day. I spent a lot of time watching John Schlesinger's 1975 film The Day of the Locust. The movie is boring and tiresome and I kept getting irritated and confused with it (a lot like I would if I were watching one of David Lynch's ridiculous nonsensical films). Some of the performances are good. It stars William Atherton, Karen Black, Donald Sutherland and Burgess Merideth. Geraldine Page makes a cameo as a faith healer (in a weird sequence totally typical of this film.) I pretty much hated it. It reminded me a lot of James Ivory's The Wild Party, actually. It's set in the same time period and it has a very similar look as far as light goes. More than Ivory, though, Day of the Locust reminded me of Lynch. And I don't like to be reminded.

But YESTERDAY, I finally saw Bernardo Bertolucci's Il Conformista (The Conformist) which is one of the best movies I've ever seen in my life. It was shot by Vittorio Storaro and stars Jean-Louis Trintignant as the eponymous conformist, a Fascist sympathizer in Mussolini's Italy. It's a gorgeous-looking film with beautiful performances and fabulous costumes. It's filled with symbolism, too. Evidently Bertolucci was a little obsessed with symbolism at the time, but as I was watching I kept thinking that I was watching a master filmmaker. This movie is superb!

Lazy Eyes and Marathon Men

I had a rather long conversation with my mother last night on the way to rehearsal. My mother doesn't talk on the phone ever, so it was an achievement just on that front, really. But I communicated to her how I feel about Michael and Deborah and everything that happened on Sunday that made me leave their house so early. I was having second thoughts about telling her all of that stuff, but she seemed genuinely glad that I was at sharing it with her. Her suggestions were helpful and kind and she is in pretty much the same boat as I, although she responds in a different way (i.e. getting angry as opposed to getting sad.)

I was invited to Jeremy's party last night, but at the last minute I decided not to go. It's just so far, and after driving miles and miles to Long Beach, driving miles and miles out of my way before driving miles and miles home just seemed so tiring. Directing exhausts me anyway, and last night seemed to be more exhausting than usual. (When I'm saying, "You should move right of him instead of left when you do that cross," and then the stage manager says, "That's actually the blocking," I know we have a problem. Don't actors write these things down?)

I did something out of the ordinary when I got home. I opened my mail and Marathon Man had just come from Netflix. Eddie was in his room when I opened my front door, so the main room was empty and beckoning. I reheated some pizza, put my phone in my room, switched on the movie, and sat there for a little over two hours, engrossed in the film. Normally I would go straight to my room, kick off my shoes and surf the web, but because the room was free...

Marathon Man was great. I guess its only Oscar nomination was Laurence Olivier's performance, but I'm not sure why. What a great movie! The screenplay was tight and clever, the direction sure-footed, and Dustin Hoffman's performance was excellent. For that matter, I much preferred Roy Scheider's performance to Olivier's (though, of course, I tend to hate on Olivier more than I ought to.) Thanks for the recommendation, Justin. Sometimes you know how to pick 'em.

I was glad I came home and watched a film. I haven't done that in a while and I needed it. It felt good: like I was taking back something that was mine.