#60 Black Cat, White Cat (Crna mačka, beli mačor) (1998)

Directed by Emir Kusturica.

This was my first experience with Emir Kusturica. What a trip! To even get the slightest idea of the tone of this movie, just watch the youtube clip I have in this post. I know it lacks subtitles, but you don't necessarily need to understand the dialogue to get a feel for what this movie is like. I highly recommend it. It is chock-full of incredibly quirky and bizarre characters that are all ridiculously hilarious. I especially got a kick out of the ubiquitous flock of domestic geese hanging around and invading so many of the scenes. I can only imagine how crazy of an experience filming this gem would have been. I think that I will foray into Kusturica's weird world again to see what else there is to discover. Oh, and I can't forget to mention the lovely Branka Katić. It was very refreshing to see such an enchanting beauty appear in a comedy and not play the one-dimensional beauty/object of desire of a story. All of Katić's charm comes shining through as she is just another member of this crazy group of individuals who all come together to create such a wonderful and bizarre world. It really makes you wonder if life is just simply like that in the Balkans.

#52 8½ (1963)

Federico Fellini.

This was the first time I ever saw this movie. And in 35mm in the theater, as well. I am so excited about this post and this movie, that every picture that I find on the internet I want to add to my post. I've restricted myself to only some of the best. Both movie posters I think are super cool. Then I have the two main actresses, Amouk Aimée, Guido's wife Luisa, and Claudia Cardinale, his muse Claudia. I also was extremely excited when I came across the animated gif of the dance scene with Mario and Gloria, which clearly was the inspiration for Tarantino's dance scene in Pulp Fiction with Travolta and Thurman, an obvious tribute to Fellini's 8½ if I ever saw one.

This movie is very difficult to write about, and I don't think I am going to try very much. I feel honestly blessed to have had the opportunity to see it in the theater even though it was a poor print and there was also a somewhat annoying older couple in the audience who laughed excessively during just about every scene. I think they were the kind of Seattlites who want to express to everybody how much they were understanding the movie by laughing at everything. You know, "we're so culturally aware and interesting. Not only do we go to 8½ in the theater, we want to make it clear that we know the film so much more than everybody else." To the point of at times repeating some phrase in italian that the character of the scene had just said with the air of like, "oh, how genius that is!" Regardless, it was impossible for me to come away from this film without thinking that it is truly one of the best films I have ever seen. And, I know that simply by its reputation as a film classic I was very hesitant to give it my approval. I guess I am very quick to think that movies are far too overrated. However, in this case, it was impossible not to adore this movie. I was completely enchanted by the actresses in this movie. Of course, the movie is about a film director struggling with his artistic voice and in particular with all the myriad women who occupy some part of his life. And Fellini does an incredible job of portraying them all. There is no way to watch this and not come away completely in love with women in all their incarnations. I was already so impressed with so many of the female characters already introduced at the point when Luisa, Guido's wife, shows up. Anouk Aimée instantly became one of my favorite actresses. And this was this first time I had ever seen her. The scene in which Guido sees her and follows her is incredible film-making at it's most basic. Her enchanting beauty and female strength was so immediately apparent to me, that I instantly fell in love with her. I was so entranced by Luisa and completely immersed by the movie that I couldn't have been rescued by anything that Fellini would do with it. And then he brought back into the picture Claudia. She had a very small shot early in the film that just gave you the idea she was going to be an insignificant extra in one of the strange dreams of Guido. But, no. He brought her back. And his portrayal of this sirena is too powerful to even try to describe in a silly blog. I only wish I could have seen the movie again immediately after it finished. Anyone who ever gets the opportunity to see this movie in the theater should legitimately feel great shame if they pass it up. I wish my meagre review could only portray a little bit how strongly I felt about this movie. 5 stars.

#50 Léolo (1992)

Written and directed by Jean-Claude Lauzon.

We decided to try this French-Canadian film based on a recommendation by a friend. It is a strange and bizarre ride. It took me two days to finish it, and by the end, I wasn't certain I was any better off than before I started. It was difficult to discern any type of chronological or even sequential storyline. There is a boy, Léolo, as the main character, who seems to escape from his strange and quirky family by his secretive hobby of writing. About the only really memorable characteristic of Léolo is that he believes that his mother was impregnated accidentally by the sperm of an Italian when she falls into a cart of tomatoes. Thus he really is not a Canadion named Leo, but an Italian named Léolo Lozone.  There are some slightly humorous sequences, but overall this movie is difficult to enjoy over the entire hour and 40 minutes.

#39 Tiny Furniture (2010)

Written and Directed by Lena Dunham.

I love Lena Dunham. I think that Girls is the funniest new show in a lot of years. So much of her humor seems right on the money. So, I was excited to finally get to see Tiny Furniture. It's a great precursor to the fame and spotlight that Dunham is to achieve with Girls. The dry humor is great, although it doesn't quite achieve the best hilarious moments in Girls. And, as would be expected with Dunham, there is a pretty funny comically awkward sex scene. Jemima Kirke and Alex Karpovsky really steal the show in many of the scenes. If you like Jessa on Girls, don't miss this movie as Kirke is even better here. ("Yeah, they’re really being bad. Do you want something to eat? Listen, I want something to eat. Let’s go into the kitchen. Let’s scrum into the kitchen and get a crust of bread or cheese.") The same can be said about Karpovsky who gets more of a main role than he's gotten in the first season plus four episodes of Girls. 

A remarkably good film debut for Dunham. I hope she and her peeps can continue to create their brand of comedy and that the sudden success of Girls won't affect her career (à la Dave Chappelle).

#27 Ruby Sparks (2012)

#21 Mujeres al borde de un ataque de nervios (Women on the verge of a nervous breakdown) (1988)

Written and directed by Pedro Almodóvar.

#15 Away We Go (2009)

Directed by Sam Mendes.

We were recommended (and in fact loaned) this movie by some close friends. I have to admit that I laughed more during this movie than during any of the rest so far. It is a funny and touching movie. It is the story of Burt and Verona a couple very much in love as they go through the life-changing experience of realizing they are about to have a baby. Verona's pregnancy naturally causes each of them to reconsider themselves and most importantly reconsider who they are as a family. When they come to the decision to remake themselves in a new location, they embark on a journey to find that destination. It takes them to different cities and different friends and relatives and in particular to different mentalities about parenting and the nature of family. The supporting cast provide a great amount of laughs in their roles as several different stereotypes. My favorite is LN (pronounced Ellen) played by Maggie Gyllenhaal whose method of parenting (aside from involving as much breastfeeding as possible, including for her six-year-old Wolfie and a colleague's baby she was asked to babysit for) is based on the concept of prohibiting the three "S"es: no separation, no sugar and no strollers. Burt, played by John Krasinski of The Office fame, also provides a good number of laughs with his goofiness. He is nicely balanced by Maya Rudolph who plays Verona, a surprisingly real-seeming person with her natural fears and emotions as a woman in her mid-thirties coming to terms with herself while still overcoming the early loss of both her parents.

I really enjoyed this movie at times. It is cheesy as hell at times as well, filled with the long "so-in-love-but-what-are-we-gonna-do" stares between Burt and Verona or their stares into the distant fields as they ask themselves those same questions and it's beautiful countryside, on-the-road scenery, sunrise shots with it's Jack Johnsonesque soft-voiced guitar ballads soundtrack that are just enough to get right up to the tipping point of making you want to puke, but what can you expect? This is definitely in the genre of a "date movie", and you've got to put up with some of that at times. Luckily this movie also makes up for it with some good laughs.

#4 - Mapa (2012)

by León Siminiani.

#2 - The Lady Vanishes (1938)

I was very impressed by the political connotations of this Hitchcock comedy. Made during the era of the British and French policies of "Appeasement" of Hitler and the Nazis, it is made clear the director's opinions on this matter. He shows the outright futility of the silly British "pacificist" in his belief that the Germans won't do anything to harm them as, "We are British citizens!" As in the 39 steps, it entails a playful love story between a couple that initially have a strong dislike for each other. I am quite more drawn to the burgeoning romance between the two main characters than I was with the 39 steps, as Margaret Lockwood is a much more interesting actress and the Michael Redgrave-played Gilbert is a playful musician with a good deal of audacity and spunk, and quite not your typical leading male from 30s/40s era films.

#1 - The 39 Steps (1935)

Naturally getting started off with one by a master, Alfred Hitchcock.

I had wanted to watch this and had it waiting on the computer when I got home from my trip. Then I realized while I was away that it appears in my favorite book Catcher in the Rye (which I try to read every year around Christmas time), as one of the few movies the Holden can tolerate and in particular because Phoebe has the whole movie memorized.

I mean if you tell old Phoebe something she knows exactly what the hell you’re talking about. I mean you can even take her anywhere with you. If you take her to a lousy movie, for instance, she knows it’s a lousy movie. If you take her to a pretty good movie, she knows it’s a pretty good movie. D.B. and I took her to see this French movie, The Baker’s Wife, with Raimu in it. It killed her. Her favourite is The 39 Steps, though, with Robert Donat. She knows the whole goddamn movie by heart, because I’ve taken her to see it about ten times. When old Donat comes up from this Scotch farmhouse, for instance, when he’s running away from the cops and all, Pheobe’ll say right out loud in the movie – right when the Scotch guy in the picture says it – ‘Can you eat the herring?’ She knows all the talk by heart. And when this professor in the picture, that really jolly German spy, sticks up his little finger with part of the middle joint missing, to show Robert Donat, old Pheobe beats him to it – she holds up her little finger at me in the dark, right in front of my face.