Head on to space, or bust(er)!
I had been on a Buster Keaton run earlier this week, slowly going through his works:
Coney Island. Fatty Arbuckle runs away from his wife and goes into the Coney Island amusement park. This is the first Fatty Arbuckle movie I've ever seen, and it also features Buster Keaton. It's mostly silly slapstick, which is weird to see because I don't find it that funny so I start observing their techniques. They exaggerate their movements by doing jerky movements, like a hop before walking. I guess it makes everything more manic. The movie was so-so until the scene in the bath house. Fatty in drag is utterly ridiculous and had me laughing quite a bit. Also, the middle third featured a lot of the rides at Coney Island which don't exist anymore. It seems like it was a fun place back then. 7/10.
The Butcher Boy. Fatty Arbuckle is an employee at a general store who is competing with another employee for the love of the female employee. Buster Keaton has a secondarily role in this, which was his first movie. There's some minor slapstick with helping the customers, but otherwise it just descends to one of those big flour- and pie-throwing finales. Except, that's not the end of the movie. It continues disjointedly with a scene at a girls' dormitory, where Fatty sneaks in in drag (again). He really looks ridiculous in these outfits, like a monster-size doll that you expect to hold one of those huge lollipops. His competitor also sneaks into the dormitory and some not-too-funny hijinks ensues. 5/10.
The Bell Boy. Another Fatty Arbuckle short where Buster Keaton gets lower billing. This time the two of them are bellboys at a crappy hotel. There's some gags when Rasputin checks into the hotel, but most of the funnies come later in the movie. Nothing too special, the slapstick's mostly worn off. 6/10.
The General. Arguably Buster Keaton's most famous film, about a Southern train engineer who gets involved in train thefts during the Civil War. I saw this all the way back in film class in high school and while I liked it then, I didn't remember very much about it besides the general setup. It's still quite funny and enjoyable. The appeal of Buster Keaton is that he does believably dumb things, but not because he's an idiot, but because he didn't quite think something through before doing it. He also gets by on a lot of dumb luck, but has several moments of ingenuity as well. It's quite a difference in comedy writing to have a normal character do a dumb thing naturally, e.g. walk into a door, versus having them just be an idiot who doesn't know anything. Besides the timelessness of the comedy, what was most surprising is how "big budget" this movie feels. All the rail scenes are on location, not scale models or in a studio, so when things are being destroyed they are really being destroyed. It adds to the weightiness of the film, making it more believable. 9/10.
Last night Christian and I watched two movies:
2010: The Year We Make Contact. The sequel to 2001, this has an American and Soviet crew return to Io and reestablish contact with the monolith, while Cold War tensions between their countries rise. This had an impressive cast: Roy Scheider, John Lithgow, Helen Mirren and Bob Balaban. Probably the best performances were from Scheider and Mirren (who does a pretty convincing Russian general), whereas Lithgow and Balaban get far less screentime. The science aspect of this movie was weak, with some basic astronomoical impossibilities occuring. However, there were several moments in the middle that were actually interesting, suggesting it could have gone along a tense, suspenseful route. Instead, it followed a pretty lame route, to an implausible finale. Transitions between scenes usually occurred in the form of narration of Scheider, in the form of letters back to his dear wife, but they explained far too much of the upcoming action so that the narration felt completely forced and unnecessary. On a positive note, the visual effects were quite solid, so it really did look like space most of the time. Unfortunately, this was ultimately a disappointing sequel to a great film. 6/10.
Side note: this observation happened both during 2001 and when the character reappeared in 2010: I find Keir Dullea, the actor who played Bowman in these films, attractive to an almost eerie extent (at least when he was younger). I don't know what it is, but he is just incredibly hot in these films.
Head On. A Greek guy in Australia fails to deal with his repressed homosexuality. So the filmmakers must have thought: angsty twenty year olds + coming out + immigrant children rebelling against traditional culture + lots and lots of drugs + monologues about hating your life and being a whore + handsome straight-acting fully-naked male lead = a gritty independent movie. Ummmm too bad they forgot to have an actual plot or character development. This movie dragged and dragged in no ostensible direction. About 40 minutes in, you start asking yourself "what point are they making?" and another 20 minutes finds you asking "why am I watching this? Why is this scene happening? What does this scene have to do with anything?" This one was painful to watch to the end. 4/10.
Coney Island. Fatty Arbuckle runs away from his wife and goes into the Coney Island amusement park. This is the first Fatty Arbuckle movie I've ever seen, and it also features Buster Keaton. It's mostly silly slapstick, which is weird to see because I don't find it that funny so I start observing their techniques. They exaggerate their movements by doing jerky movements, like a hop before walking. I guess it makes everything more manic. The movie was so-so until the scene in the bath house. Fatty in drag is utterly ridiculous and had me laughing quite a bit. Also, the middle third featured a lot of the rides at Coney Island which don't exist anymore. It seems like it was a fun place back then. 7/10.
The Butcher Boy. Fatty Arbuckle is an employee at a general store who is competing with another employee for the love of the female employee. Buster Keaton has a secondarily role in this, which was his first movie. There's some minor slapstick with helping the customers, but otherwise it just descends to one of those big flour- and pie-throwing finales. Except, that's not the end of the movie. It continues disjointedly with a scene at a girls' dormitory, where Fatty sneaks in in drag (again). He really looks ridiculous in these outfits, like a monster-size doll that you expect to hold one of those huge lollipops. His competitor also sneaks into the dormitory and some not-too-funny hijinks ensues. 5/10.
The Bell Boy. Another Fatty Arbuckle short where Buster Keaton gets lower billing. This time the two of them are bellboys at a crappy hotel. There's some gags when Rasputin checks into the hotel, but most of the funnies come later in the movie. Nothing too special, the slapstick's mostly worn off. 6/10.
The General. Arguably Buster Keaton's most famous film, about a Southern train engineer who gets involved in train thefts during the Civil War. I saw this all the way back in film class in high school and while I liked it then, I didn't remember very much about it besides the general setup. It's still quite funny and enjoyable. The appeal of Buster Keaton is that he does believably dumb things, but not because he's an idiot, but because he didn't quite think something through before doing it. He also gets by on a lot of dumb luck, but has several moments of ingenuity as well. It's quite a difference in comedy writing to have a normal character do a dumb thing naturally, e.g. walk into a door, versus having them just be an idiot who doesn't know anything. Besides the timelessness of the comedy, what was most surprising is how "big budget" this movie feels. All the rail scenes are on location, not scale models or in a studio, so when things are being destroyed they are really being destroyed. It adds to the weightiness of the film, making it more believable. 9/10.
Last night Christian and I watched two movies:
2010: The Year We Make Contact. The sequel to 2001, this has an American and Soviet crew return to Io and reestablish contact with the monolith, while Cold War tensions between their countries rise. This had an impressive cast: Roy Scheider, John Lithgow, Helen Mirren and Bob Balaban. Probably the best performances were from Scheider and Mirren (who does a pretty convincing Russian general), whereas Lithgow and Balaban get far less screentime. The science aspect of this movie was weak, with some basic astronomoical impossibilities occuring. However, there were several moments in the middle that were actually interesting, suggesting it could have gone along a tense, suspenseful route. Instead, it followed a pretty lame route, to an implausible finale. Transitions between scenes usually occurred in the form of narration of Scheider, in the form of letters back to his dear wife, but they explained far too much of the upcoming action so that the narration felt completely forced and unnecessary. On a positive note, the visual effects were quite solid, so it really did look like space most of the time. Unfortunately, this was ultimately a disappointing sequel to a great film. 6/10.
Side note: this observation happened both during 2001 and when the character reappeared in 2010: I find Keir Dullea, the actor who played Bowman in these films, attractive to an almost eerie extent (at least when he was younger). I don't know what it is, but he is just incredibly hot in these films.
Head On. A Greek guy in Australia fails to deal with his repressed homosexuality. So the filmmakers must have thought: angsty twenty year olds + coming out + immigrant children rebelling against traditional culture + lots and lots of drugs + monologues about hating your life and being a whore + handsome straight-acting fully-naked male lead = a gritty independent movie. Ummmm too bad they forgot to have an actual plot or character development. This movie dragged and dragged in no ostensible direction. About 40 minutes in, you start asking yourself "what point are they making?" and another 20 minutes finds you asking "why am I watching this? Why is this scene happening? What does this scene have to do with anything?" This one was painful to watch to the end. 4/10.