The Subject Was Movies: Cheap and Good
Hulu has Playlists for movies. You can see some good movies for Cheap (FREE!) as long as it lasts.
These movies are on the Final Films Playlist. It is a list of five of the last films made by some noted directors.
L'Argent by Robert Bresson
I am not familiar with his films, and I can see why not. L'Argent is a very stilted and distant film that is "acted" by non-actors, very few of whom make any impression on the viewer or the story.
I suppose that Mr. Bresson wanted to go with the pure story routine, but I think that he should have done a radio play or just had a narrator tell the story. That way, the audience has the remove from the "Implied" way of the story telling (if that is possible), and can imagine or infer its own subtext and meaning on the film. This is not the way to do films (I don't think that you can do them this way and Mr. Bresson's failure in this film provides the proof of that), but it is an interesting attempt to make Fiction a Documentary without the Irony that is too prevalent in most TV and Films of this day.
The story is taken from a short story from Tolstoy (or so I have read, but not the story by Tolstoy---just an aside, but for the best Beach and Pool Reading this summer, get a copy of War and Peace by Tolstoy. It has everything and is a pleasure to just read for Trash Reading---forget the highbrow imputations that the Literary Masters and Mistresses have given it). That surprised me because the story reads like one of Dostoevsky's Dark Jokey Comedies (and I know that it is not popular, but really, Dostoevsky is a Comic Novelist---I can't read his work any other way).
A couple of privileged and arrogant school boys pass off some counterfeit money to a store that then knowingly passes off the counterfeit money to a heating oil pumper and driver who unknowingly tries to use it to buy lunch. The driver is caught and prosecuted with false testimony from the salespeople at the store. And it all begins to spiral down for the unlucky driver. He loses his job and initiates himself in a Real Robbery in the Real World of Crime and is caught at that too. The only thing that the driver is good at or lucky with is getting caught. The driver goes to jail and loses his wife and child and....it goes on and on. It gets worse and worse, and every once in while, some "good" character comments on the Goodness of God and His Justice. Now, you can see why I thought this was a Dostoevsky story.
The only character that really stood out to me was a typical Dostoevsky "Good" woman who claimed that her husband drank and lost his work because of her. Yeah, she was all powerful like Jesus and all the sins of her world could be traced back to her. It is a delightful piece of irony that the last horrible event in the movie can be traced back to her and a good deed that she did. The non-actor who played her was one of the few in the film who had an actual presence and she did embody the character. Was that a bad piece of casting by Mr. Bresson?
Street of Shame by Kenji Mizoguchi
This is just a good movie that can be enjoyed for the story. You don't have to start worrying about its meaning, particularly if you don't want to.
In postwar Japan, the Diet and its politicians are pondering ridding the country of brothels (they appear to be licensed and allowed). The brothel owners and its employees are none too happy about it. The brothel owners will have to find some other line of work and they will lose money. The employees are not happy about being hookers, but they are in the business to earn the money to pay over-whelming debts incurred by their families or themselves. The employees will be able to renounce any debts to the brothel owners if they leave, but most of them can't find jobs anywhere else doing anything else. It's not easy being a whore or a pimp.
The movie tells the story of five whores and their pimps, Master and Mistress.
L'Atalante by Jean Vigo
An odd romance that floats in dreams and anchors in the harsh world of the Great Depression of the 20th Century. It is never what you think that it is.
Recommended.
An Autumn Afternoon by Yasujirho Ozu
If you ever have the chance to see a movie by the Japanese Master, Mr. Ozu, take it.
Mr. Ozu is the Japanese Jane Austin of the movies. His movies are all about that Universal Truth: “It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife.”
In Mr. Ozu's movies, there is always a daughter who must be married. And a father who must find her a good husband.
The bridal scene in Mr. Ozu's movies is always gorgeous. A Japanese Bride in all her Traditional Finery and Kimonos is more beautiful than any Royal British Wedding Bride. But the movie never ends on the Wedding. It ends with the lonely Father who must adjust to his life without his daughter to tend to him.
Recommended.
Confidentially Yours by François Truffaut
This was Mr. Truffaut's homage to one of his most admired directors, Alfred Hitchcock.
The story isn't that interesting, but Fanny Ardant is a joy to watch. She has gumption and courage and cheek as Barbara Becker, the intrepid heroine, who rescues her man from a false conviction. She is better than any vapid blonde Hitchcock heroine. She is Nancy Drew!