Sweetgrass: This unadorned documentary tells the story of the two (heterosexual) cowboys who drove thousands of sheep on the last sheep drive in Montana’s Beartooth Mountains. Because it is not dressed up with narration or music, the audience is left with the story, the people, their quest, the sheep and the landscape – and that’s more than enough.
If you’re life is too frenetic, pop this movie on and take a contemplative 101 minute respite.
As my friend Keith always advises me, movie distributors send out their weakest material in August. Make lemonade out of the lemons by catching up on the better movies from earlier in the year.
Inception and Toy Story 3 are two of the year’s best. If you want a thriller, go with The Girl Who Played With Fire. Robert Duvall gives another masterful performance in Get Low. For an indie dramedy, try The Kids Are All Right. For trailers and other choices, see Movies to See Right Now.
My DVD of the week is a British coming of age drama from earlier this year, Fish Tank. For the trailers and other DVD choices, see DVDs of the Week.
Elizabeth Taylor and Montgomery Clift in A Place in the Sun
Movies on TV include Cool Hand Luke, A Place in the Sun, A Face in the Crowd, Anatomy of a Murder, and The Stunt Man, all coming up on TCM.
This is the time of year where you can still see the best movies – by avoiding the theaters. Fortunately, there are some great movies on TV during late August – and here are six of them. Thank God (and Ted Turner) for Turner Classic Movies.
Cool Hand Luke (1967): Paul Newman plays a free-spirited character that refuses to bend to The System – even in a Southern chain gang. Many memorable scenes include the fight with George Kennedy’s Dragline, the wager on eating a massive amount of hardboiled eggs, getting sent to the hole, the scariest aviator sunglasses ever and the unforgettable: “What we’ve got here is failure to communicate”. One of my 10 Best Prison Movies and 10 Most Memorable Food Scenes. TCM 8/21
A Place in the Sun:One of the great films of the 1950s. Montgomery Clift is a poor kid who is satisfied to have a job and a trashy girlfriend (Shelly Winters in a brilliant portrayal). Then, he learns that he could have it all – the CEO’s daughter Elizabeth Taylor, lifelong comfort, status and career. Did I mention Elizabeth Taylor? The now pregnant girlfriend is the only obstacle to more than he could have ever dreamed for – can he get rid of her without getting caught? TCM 8/23
Andy Griffith as the charming, phony and venal Lonesome Rhodes
A Face in the Crowd (1957): This is a brilliant political classic by Elia Kazan. Lonesome Rhodes (Andy Griffith) is a failed country guitar picker who is hauled out of an Arkansas drunk tank by talent scout Marcia Jeffries (Patricia Neal). It turns out that he has a folksy charm that is dynamite in the new medium of television. He quickly rises in the infotainment universe until he is an A List celeb and a political power broker. To Jeffries’ horror, Rhodes reveals himself to be an evil, power hungry megalomaniac. Jeffries made him – can she break him? The seduction of a gullible public by a good timin’ charmer predicts the careers of Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush, although Lonesome Rhodes is meaner than Reagan and less ideological than Bush. One of my 10 Best Political Movies. TCM 8/26
James Stewart and George C. Scott tangle in Anatomy of a Murder
Anatomy of a Murder (1959): Otto Preminger delivers a classic courtroom drama that frankly addresses sexual mores. James Stewart is a folksy but very canny lawyer defending a cynical soldier (Ben Gazzara) on a murder charge; did he discover his wife straying or is he avenging her rape? Lee Remick portrays the wife with a penchant for partying and uncertain fidelity. The Duke Ellington score could be the very best jazz score in the movies. Joseph Welch, the real-life lawyer who stood up to Sen. Joe McCarthy in a televised red scare hearing, plays the judge. TCM 8/26 score
The Stunt Man (1980): Steve Railback plays a young fugitive chased on to a movie location shoot. The director (Peter O’Toole) hides him out on the set as long as he works as a stunt double in increasingly hazardous stunts. He is attracted to the leading lady (Barbara Hershey). It doesn’t take long for him to doubt the director’s good will and to learn that not everything is as it seems. Shot on location at San Diego’s famed Hotel Del Coronado. One of my Overlooked Masterworks. Listen to Director Robert Rush describe his movie in this clip. TCM 8/28
The Outlaw Josey Wales (1976): This is one of my very favorite Westerns. Clint Eastwood directs the movie and plays a Civil War vet on the run, who unwillingly picks up a set of misfits and strays on his journey. TCM 8/31
A damaged and angry young woman from the British lower class has the second-worst mother in recent films (after Mo’Nique’s role in Precious). She dreams of dancing her way out of the neighborhood in a talent contest. Then her mother brings home a new boyfriend who kindles new feelings in the teen. This development culminates in a scene where she dances to the Bobby Womack version of California Dreamin‘ while the audience holds its breath.
In her first film role, Katie Jarvis plays the girl; Jarvis was discovered by the filmmakers during a sidewalk argument with her boyfriend that convinced them that she could muster the sustained rage (and foul mouth) required by the role. Michael Fassbender is excellent as the mother’s new boyfriend.
Inception andToy Story 3 are two of the year’s best.If you want a thriller, go with The Girl Who Played With Fire. Robert Duvall gives another masterful performance in Get Low. For an indie dramedy, try The Kids Are All Right. For trailers and other choices, see Movies to See Right Now.
My DVD of the week is the great 1995 documentary, Crumb. For the trailers and other DVD choices, see DVDs of the Week.
Movies on TV include The Set-Up, Leave Her to Heaven and The Fallen Sparrow, all coming up on TCM.
Crumb (1995): The Criterion Collection has released a great documentary, Terry Zwigoff’s profile of the counterculture cartoonist R. Crumb, the creator of Keep On Truckin’, Mr. Natural, Fritz the Cat and influential rock album covers. By exploring Crumb’s troubled family, Zwigoff reveals the origins of Crumb’s art. When we meet Crumb’s shattered brothers, it’s clear that Crumb’s artistic expression preserved his very sanity.
In honor of At The Movies, which ends its long run on television, let’s hear Siskel & Ebert assess Crumb. Siskel placed it #1 on his Top 10 list for 1995 and Ebert had it at #2.
Check out my other recent DVD recommendations at DVDs of the Week.
I recommend the summer’s one high quality blockbuster, Inception. If you have followed The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, you will want to continue the trilogy with The Girl Who Played With Fire. The indie dramedy The Kids Are All Right is enjoyable, too. One of the year’s best, Toy Story 3, is still playing. For trailers and other choices, see Movies to See Right Now.
My DVD of the week is one of 2010’s best: A Prophet (Un Prophete). For the trailers and other DVD choices, see DVDs of the Week.
Gene Tierney in Leave Her to Heaven
Movies on TV include The Set-Up and Leave Her to Heaven, coming up on TCM.
This week’s DVD of the Week is a film from earlier this year: A Prophet (Un Prophete). It is the story of a young French-Arab from his first terrifying day in prison to his release. Once he starts to adjust to his role in the prison as the toady of a Corsican crime boss, no one else in the movie knows what he is really thinking. It evokes the DeNiro scenes in The Godfather: Part II, except set with gritty realism in contemporary France. Nominated for the Best Foreign Language Oscar. One of my Best Movies of 2010 – So Far and pretty high on my list of 10 Best Prison Movies.
Check out my other recent DVD recommendations at DVDs of the Week.
Joseph Gordon Levitt and Leonardo DiCaprio in Inception
I recommend the summer’s one high quality blockbuster, Inception. If you have followed The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, you will want to continue the trilogy with The Girl Who Played With Fire. The indie dramedy The Kids Are All Right is enjoyable, too. One of the year’s best, Toy Story 3, is still playing, but the equally great Winter’s Bone has become difficult to find. For trailers and other choices, see Movies to See Right Now.
My DVDs of the week are the gnarly Step into Liquid and the way awesome Riding Giants. For the trailers and other DVD choices, see DVDs of the Week.
Movies on TV include The Searchers and Bad Day at Black Rock, coming up on TCM. Before Sunrise is still playing on IFC.
It’s a great time for the two coolest surfing movies, the documentaries Step Into Liquid and Riding Giants.
Step Into Liquid (2003): We see the world’s best pro surfers in the most extreme locations. We also see devoted amateurs in the tiny ripples of Lake Michigan and surfing evangelists teaching Irish school children. The cinematography is remarkable – critic Elvis Mitchell called the film “insanely gorgeous”. The filmmaker is Dana Brown, son of Bruce Brown, who made The Endless Summer (1966) and The Endless Summer II (1994).
Riding Giants (2004): This film focuses on the obsessive search for the best wave by some of the greatest surfers in history. We see “the biggest wave ever ridden” and then a monster that could be bigger. The movie traces the discovery of the Half Moon Bay surf spot Mavericks. And more and more, all wonderfully shot.
The filmmaker is Stacy Peralta, a surfer and one the pioneers of modern skateboading, (and a founder of the Powell Peralta skateboard product company). Peralta also made Dogtown and Z-boys (2001), the great documentary about the roots of skateboarding, and wrote the 2005 Lords of Dogtown.
Check out my other recent DVD recommendations at DVDs of the Week.
